


A Series of Firsts

by Aelys_Althea



Series: Rays of Darkness and Shadowed Light [2]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Development of Relationship, F/M, First Times, Fluff, Insomnia, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-08-13
Packaged: 2018-07-18 08:07:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 53,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7306837
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aelys_Althea/pseuds/Aelys_Althea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will loves Nico. And Nico, begrudgingly, sort of maybe loves Will back.<br/>It was as simple and as complicated as that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. First Games

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This story is the SEQUEL of 'The Error Of His Ways'. I guess it could probably be read as a stand alone but... up to you. It sort of acts as an intermission between the first installment and the story that follows - yes, I've written another one because I'm obsessed. Both the light, fluffy and superficial and the sort of deeper, more integral parts of the building of a relationship is included. Be prepared both for said fluffiness and explicit scenes, the latter of which, really, is only really in one chapter. If it doesn't agree with you, then you could probably skip it :)
> 
> Disclaimer: All characters, situations and contexts are derived initially from Rick Riodran's Percy Jackson Series - primarily The Blood of Olympus and The Trials of Apollo. Again (seriously?), I do not make any profits or benefits from this work save for the sheer enjoyment of about one of my favourite pairings.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: How Will Solace created a monster.

"At least do me the favour of giving it a try."

"Why should I? I'm perfectly happy with the ones that _I_ play. I don't need any new ones."

"Oh, so _Risk_ was one of yours, then? From eighty years ago? And _Dominion_ , and _Carcassonne_ , and _Monopoly_ , even."

"That's not the same –"

"What about _Blackjack_ , or _Poker_ , or _Spades_? You'd never played any of them before either."

Nico scowled in a way that always made Will smile, becoming the dark little cloud of grumbling shadow in the middle of the Apollo cabin. Will couldn't help himself, despite knowing that it baffled Nico to the point of frustration. Or maybe it was because he knew it did. There was something just so amusing about watching Nico scowl, or shoot daggers at people with his eyes, glaring menacingly in a way that would have slaughtered half of the camp if looks could kill. Did that make Will a little bit twisted, that he thought that way?

Maybe. Just a little.

Folding his arms, Nico pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes. "For your information, _Poker_ and _Blackjack_ were around when I was born. I'm not that old."

Will shrugged. "Yeah, but you'd never played them before, right?"

"That's irrelevant."

"Oh, I think it's very relevant, actually. Really, Nico, why are you digging your heels in so much with this? Scared you'll lose?"

Will knew he'd taken his taunts one step too far when Nico's eyes drooped from a glare into a deceptively nonchalant hooded stare. The rest of the demigods of Apollo, chattering excitedly as they collected every known gaming device and accompanying games, fell watchfully silent as though they sensed the growing cloud. From his periphery – for Will didn't dare blink away from Nico's gaze; he'd probably make a lunge for his throat at the barest glimmer of distraction – Will could see a mixture of wariness, amusement and eagerness. As though they knew what was coming and looked forward to it.

"Are you challenging my capabilities, Will?" Nico asked. His voice was low, devoid of any amusement as though he was genuinely insulted by Will's suggesting.

Keeping it casual, Will shrugged. "That depends. Are you too chicken to try?"

The very air seemed to grow darker around Nico. Few would perhaps guess from the surly nonchalance he approached most things – even if he was getting better with his attempts at neutrality if not so much positivity – but Nico was fiercely competitive when it came to games. Closet competitive, until Will managed to draw him from that secretiveness and fling him into the open. Sometimes he wondered if it was such a good thing, even if it did mean that more often than not the team Nico was on for Capture the Flag – Will's team, obviously – would win.

With a jerk of his chin towards the wide television screen, turning with a speed that caused several children of Apollo to flinch and Fionn to fall bodily off the couch, Nico's face became deceptively blank. "Fine, then. Bring it on, stupid Quack."

Will barely even twitched at the derogatory nickname that Nico had adopted for him. He was distracted by the flurry of movement that abruptly erupted around him. As though Nico's words were a trigger invoking action, every member of the Apollo cabin present, of which was a large majority of their total number, leapt into action. Curtains were drawn across the windows to create an ambiance of focused intensity, the surround sound speakers plugged in and consoles hefted from their recharging stations. Chairs were drawn and cushions tossed onto the floor for where seating was scarce, and somewhere at the back of the cabin Will could make out the distinctive sound of jelly beans being poured into a bowl.

Grin widening, almost painfully when Nico turned his hooded, accusing stare upon him, he stepped up to his side, looping an arm around his neck – which Nico naturally tried to shrug off – and drew him towards the arrangement of couches. They seated themselves as their fellow demigods assembled the setting to the greatest ideal; Will was usually the sort of person who would be on his feet and attempting to help his half-siblings with whatever they were doing, but someone had to make sure Nico didn't act out in snarling aggression. Besides, it was his prerogative as the cabin counsellor to sit and order other people to work, a right Will rarely invoked.

The members of Apollo's cabin didn't begrudge him assigning tasks. Far from it, they jumped to work with enthusiasm and eagerness. Since the moment that Will had let slip that he was _finally_ going to introduce Nico to the world of gaming – Nico didn't have a choice, he was going to learn even rudimentarily – a flock of grinning siblings had practically lived in his shadow. Not only because they largely enjoyed watching Will be verbally beaten to a pulp – which had only actually _really_ happened once – but because the children of Apollo had taken to Nico over the past months like fish to water. He was their pseudo-member, their dark little mascot and a communally acknowledged honorary child of Apollo, though no one dared to speak as much aloud for fear that Nico would hear them and growl accusingly at such coddling. They doted upon him, each in their own particular ways, but every demigod at Camp Half-Blood lived in fear of the moment Nico snapped and unleashed a legion of dead warrior upon them.

He hadn't done yet, but, as Tyler the resident Athena-mimic of cabin seven liked to claim, there was still time.

Kayla dropped down onto the couch beside Nico and handed him a controller which he resisted taking for a moment before taking gingerly. Somehow – Will didn't know how he managed – he made it look awkward to simply hold.

"Don't worry, it won't bite," Kayla said with a grin.

"I'm not worried it's going to bite. It's a bloody gaming controller."

"You look tense, Nico," Austin said, plopping himself down on Will's other side. He graciously offered his bowl of candy for the picking. "Have a jelly bean. Calms the nerves."

"I'm not nervous either. I told you, it's just a bloody game."

"And the day that you sincerely mean "it's just a game" is the day that pigs will fly," Will grinned, jostling Nico slightly. He received a scowl for his efforts. Evidently, Nico was _not_ in the mood.

The rest of the children of Apollo scattered themselves around the television, half a dozen holding controllers while the rest fidgeted and rearranged pillows, handed around bowls of jelly beans and popcorn that had come from Gods knew where. Wesley was the one who fired up the screen and a blast of synthesised music blared with the appearance of the start menu, loud enough to make Fionn topple off her seat again.

Nico raised an eyebrow at the screen. "Mario Kart? Seriously?"

"Figured we'd just start off with the classics, the oldies but the goodies. Something easier," Wesley explained.

Sadly enough, he did so without glancing in Nico's direction so failed to see the dangerous shadow flash across his face. "Easy?"

"Not 'easy'," Will hastened to assure him. He didn't want Wesley pulverised for his carelessness. "Just easi _er_." He waved an expansive hand as Nico turned his sceptically raised eyebrow towards him. "You know, not so structurally complex. Not like an RPG or button-masher that usually has more bulk and plotline going on. Or takes more practice."

"Are you belittling me?" Nico asked flatly.

"Of course not, Death Kid. Never."

"Don't call me Death Kid."

Will only grinned in reply as he accepted the controller that Kayla handed him. Or perhaps forsook to him with an expression of "rather you than me" clearly writ across her face. He nodded towards Wesley as the younger boy, hands grasping his own controller, turned to him expectantly. "Whenever you're ready, Wes."

He spared a glance for Nico as he deliberately ignored Kayla explanation as to which buttons to use for what. Nico stared at him with slowly blinking eyes. "I don't know why you're so keen for me to do this. You're the one who always calls me technologically incompetent."

"I am," Will nodded. "And as the one who accuses you of such I feel duty-bound to try and fix your incompetency."

"I'm…incompetent."

"With computers? Definitely." Will chose to ignore the cold accusation in Nico's stare. No, he wasn't in the mood _at all._ "And in the twenty-first century, Nico, that's not something that any self-respecting teenager should be."

Nico frowned. He dropped his gaze down to the controller and tentatively pressed at each of the buttons. "It seems kind of flimsy."

"Flimsy? What do you –?"

"Like if I happened to whack someone over the head with it then it might break."

Will snorted. "You'd never actually whack someone. You're all bark and no bite, Nico. Everyone knows it."

Nico shot him a glare, thumb giving a pointed flick at the joystick. "Don't tempt me to remedy that fact."

Will laughed but otherwise didn't reply. He didn't really get a chance, for in that moment he lost himself into choosing players and throwing himself into the focus of simulated racing. The cheering of the Apollo members as they egged onward the four players engaged in the first round renewed his grin, almost as much as lapping Nico for the second time did.

He didn't feel all that guilty for throwing his boyfriend under the bus. Not in this instance. Will figured that he may as well make the most of it for, technologically incompetent as he might now be, Will knew for a fact that sheer pride and competitiveness wouldn't allow Nico to remain as such for long.

* * *

Will quickly came to the realisation that he'd created a monster.

It hadn't taken Nico a day to grow accustomed to the basic game of Mario Kart. It hadn't even taken him an hour. Three games. Three games was all it took and he begun to beat his fellow racers. It didn't matter that he'd never played a computer game before, nor that he cringed slightly at even the thought of receiving a phone call. Technologically incompetent he may be, but his stubbornness to admit defeat, or to even let anyone beat him, quickly overrode the discrepancy between his skill level and those of the Apollo demigods.

By the end of the day, he'd beaten them all.

It seemed to have opened up a channel of unexplored wonder for Nico. Will hadn't exactly intended for that to happen – oh, he wanted Nico to learn how to use a computer, to feel comfortable with exploring the internet and to be able to make a phone call when safe to do so without exploding the device in his hand, for sure. He'd thought that attacking the issue of reluctance through games would be a stepping-stone to that end. And he was right. It was. A very briefly stepped upon stepping-stone.

After one day, Nico mastered rudimentary games. By the end of the week, he was most likely to be found with his head bent over a computer, or a portable gaming device, or sprawled upon the couch in Apollo's cabin with an almost bored expression as he blasted his fellow demigods in various multiplayer and shoot-'em-up games. More likely than he was to be practicing in combat – which wasn't unexpected given that he tended towards practicing at night anyway – or with his nose in a book, or simply lying in the shade with his headphones on and detaching himself from the world. It was a step in the right direction that he interacted more with the rest of the campers, although much of that interaction was smirks as he pummelled them in defeat or scowls when they managed to get a shot in. Intimidation, unfortunately, naturally followed.

Will felt like almost more like a proud parent than a boyfriend in that instance. A proud, slightly unnerved, and just a little apologetic parent. He'd gotten more than a few glances over the last few days from his half siblings of faint horror that clearly asked, "What have you done?"

Will didn't exactly know. He only knew that he felt an obligation of sorts towards Nico to teach him something that he was so vastly out of his depth in so that he was just slightly less ostracised. It was infrequent enough that Will was the one to teach Nico anything anyway. 'To teach' was more like pulling teeth when it came to the son of Hades.

He couldn't have predicted the full impact of his actions. It was more than slightly amusing, though, and though they still played endless amounts of board games and cards, it was a good change of pace to lose themselves in _Halo_ , or _Call of Duty,_ or, because Nico was and always would be a massive nerd for anything mythological or fantastical, _World of Warcraft_. Will doubted that after a week or two anyone watching would even be able to tell that he'd only picked up a gaming controller, only touched a laptop with the intentions of using it, so recently.

And yes, Will might just be a little be satisfied with the unexpected intimacy of playing one another in on handheld games. To his delight – an unexpected delight, because he honestly hadn't anticipated it – they would quite often link their devices and simply laze against one another with casual comfort, Nico dropping his head into Will's lap as often as the reverse. It was an unexpected and thoroughly satisfying discovery, especially considering that in most every other instance Nico would be more likely to kick him skyward with a well-aimed boot of his foot than allow himself to be touched so casually in an even remotely public situation.

Not with gaming. It was like a switch was flicked in his mind that overwhelmed his aversion to most anything else in exchange for fixated, almost obsessive focus. Nico became like that sometimes with games. It was as unnerving as it was amusing.

Will lying across Nico's lap as they battled alongside one another on their own devices of an afternoon was how Percy found them. It would have been nearly two weeks after Nico's induction to the world of computerised gaming but Will wouldn't have been able to pick him from the crowd as being a newbie. And that was to say nothing of his previous hesitancy to use anything technological. Nico even logged onto the internet the other day for no other reason that to conduct a quick internet search rather than hook himself up for an online game.

Will was so proud of him. Proud, and a little surprised at just how natural it seemed to come to Nico, not to mention more than a little smug that after years of living in the twenty-first century it was _Will_ that had finally pushed him into it.

"Knock, knock."

Will glanced up briefly from his screen, only to curse when, in his brief distraction, his avatar was riddled with machine-gun fire. The latest obsession they'd both fallen into – in the last two days – was a game appropriately called _Chaos in the Underworld_ , and Will had already lost a significant number of hours into gunfire and sword-fights, quests and missions. It might have been nothing but a game but he'd become invested in both the game and his character. Thankfully, Nico's avatar to stepped on screen a second later to protect him in offensive defence.

"Thanks."

Nico only gave a small grunt of acknowledgement. He didn't even glance up

Lifting his head from where it rested on Nico's leg – he hadn't even seemed to notice when Will had stretched himself half across him on the couch – Will turned once more towards the doorway to the cabin. Percy was poking his head inside, his typical crooked grin stretching across his face and nodding a greeting to Margery across the room who raised a brief hand of welcome.

"Hey, Percy. What are you doing in camp?"

Percy shrugged, stepping into the cabin and immediately shrugging off his heavy overcoat as the door clicked shut behind him. It was rather warm inside cabin seven, Will had to admit. Just the way that, without exception, _every_ child of Apollo liked it. "Annabeth just wanted to swing by and ask Chiron something or other so we made it a day trip."

"That's a big trip considering she just wanted to ask something."

"You telling me. But it was either that or give a call, and Iris messages have been playing up lately."

Will nodded his understanding. No one quite knew what was going on with that but so long as it wasn't greatly distressing anyone it didn't much matter. Phone calls were rarely used more as a precaution than any great concern, but even if they weren't Chiron wasn't really prone to using them. "What's up?"

Percy shrugged and strolled over towards them. Will swung his legs from the end of the couch to make room for him to take a seat and sat up. Nico barely even glanced towards Percy, giving a brief nod before turning back towards his screen. The fluttering twitch and infinitesimal switching of his fingers was as slight and natural as that of an expert. "Just coming to say hi. And to see…" He trailed off and shook his head at Nico. "Unbelievable."

"I know, right?" Will agreed with a smirk.

"When did this happen, exactly?"

"About two weeks ago."

"No shit. You wouldn't pick it."

"Right?"

"I can hear you, you know," Nico said in a bored tone. He didn't glance up from his screen. "It's called multitasking."

"Wow, you can do that, too?"

"Shut up, Percy."

Percy only snickered, then fell back to assuming an expression of incredulity. "I never would have picked it. I mean, when we first met, Nico, you were kind of a mythomagic nerd –"

"I resent the connotations of your use of the term 'nerd'."

"- but you wouldn't use a computer or a cell phone to save your life." Percy turned towards Will, who was only distractedly thumbing at his own game, and clapped him on the shoulder. "I assume this was your doing? Well done, my man. This is a giant's step, this is. You know Jason and I had to load up an Ipod for him with his weird playlist because he wouldn't bend his neck to learn to do it himself?"

Will gave him a grin. He liked Percy – naturally, because everybody liked Percy – and not even begrudgingly as he once had when he'd discovered that Nico had harboured a secret crush on him. Granted, the fact that he and Nico had officially started 'dating', even if dates as such weren't expressly involved all that much, probably had a lot to do with that. It just made it funnier that Nico, after a sidelong glare, only disregarded Percy's comment in favour of his game.

"You up for a challenge then, Nico?" Percy asked, turning his attention towards Nico once more.

"Depends," Nico said distractedly. "I doubt you'd be much of a challenge."

"Hey, that's not fair! I'm capable. What have you got, Will?" Percy slipped off the couch and crawled across the floor towards the tangle of cables, gaming devices and controls plugged in a mess around the wide television. "Anything good?"

"Define good."

"Fun, not too hard core, doesn't require me to have spent hours learning the background of a kingdom or anything." Percy grinned over his shoulder. "The classics, you know?"

"If you're going classics, Wesley apparently thinks that Mario Kart is the prime contender," Nico muttered, and to anyone listening he probably sounded like he was barely even aware of his own words. Will wouldn't be all that surprised if he wasn't. "To hear him preach, it's the be all and end all of games." Nico snorted and muttered something that may have been Italian under his breath.

"Mario Kart? Gods, I haven't played that in years." Percy was already riffling through the exhaustive library of games. "You up for it?"

Nico actually paused his game at that. He glanced up from his screen, eyebrows rising slightly. "Seriously? You actually want to get smashed?"

"Don't underestimate my abilities, Nico. I know what I'm doing – been playing this kind of thing since I was a kid."

"Don't speak too soon," Will cautioned, though he could already feel the rising tide of amusement well within him. It was actually hilarious to see anyone challenge Nico for the first time, as though they had to experience for themselves a thrashing defeat before they believed the truth. All of Apollo's cabin, Hephaestus' cabin and most of Hermes' kids had reached the conclusion that he had been pulling a fast one with claiming that he'd never played a video game before that first afternoon.

"You have a character preference?" Percy asked as he handed a controller to Nico. He offered one to Will, but Will only shook his head with a smile. It was always more fun to watch this sort of encounter than to participate in it.

"As the son of Hades I think it's my right to be the ghost."

"Does this mean that I can call you 'King Boo' from now on?"

Nico afforded him a flat stare that he only dared him too. Percy just laughed.

He wasn't laughing ten minutes and three races later when they finally ended their brief competition. Instead, he turned incredulous eyes to Nico once more, faintly shaking his head. Nico, naturally, had deliberately picked up his hand-held gamer, slumped back into his seat and fallen back into _Chaos in the Underworld._ Will didn't miss the faintly smug expression on his face, however.

Slowly, Percy turned his attention to Will. "What have you created?"

"You'd be surprised how often I've been asked that question over the past few weeks."

"Seriously, dude, what the hell?" He turned back to Nico, the shaking of his head becoming more prominent as a grin renewed itself upon his face. "How does someone even learn that quickly?"

"He does spend a lot of time on the computer, and the TV, and online these days." Will idly flicked at his own game and booted it back into wakefulness as he spoke. "It's more of a struggle to pull him away from them, actually. He finished the main story of _Halo_ – the version that Alex has, I'm not sure what it was; _Combat Evolved_ I think it was? – in not even half a day."

"Don't talk about me like I'm not here, Will," Nico repeated once more in his distracted tone. It was hardly even a reprimand.

"So what, practice and persistence?" Percy gave a sharp shake of his head. "You should start up a motivational speaking blog for gamers, although… well, they probably wouldn't need it. But you mustn't sleep at all!"

"Sleep is for the weak. There's more important stuff to do."

"You're not sleeping?" Will glanced up at Nico with a frown, lowering the device in his hands. He knew Nico didn't sleep well, that he often actively avoided sleep at times for reasons he had yet to fully explain but that Will could deduce for himself. But to not sleep at all?

"Will, settle down. Your Quack is leaking out again." Nico didn't even look up from his screen.

Struggling to smooth his frown – they'd talk about that later, regardless of what Nico would say about him being an overprotective nag – Will glanced back towards Percy. "You know he's basically commandeered my laptop."

"Sucks to be you, bro."

"Tell me about it. I actually thought some satyr had nicked it for the first three days it was missing."

Percy chuckled, rising to his feet. "You really have created a monster."

Will glanced back towards Nico and couldn't withhold a smile at the expression of blank fixation on his face as he clicked and swiped his fingers compulsively. "Don't I know it. He's just your regular old competitive little Goth Boy boyfriend."

"Don't call me Goth Boy, Will, or I'll –"

"Glare at me, I know." Will finished. He smirked as Nico, predictably, flashed him a hooded glance.

"You're too good to him," Percy said, rounding the couch and swiping a companionable ruffle of Nico's hair as he past. Nico batted him away with a scowl. "Letting him steal your laptop _and_ beat you in games? He's walking all over you, Will."

Will shrugged, readjusting himself so he was lying extended along the couch once more and dropping his head onto the edge of Nico's lap. It was a testament to the fact that they were progressing in their relationship, if slowly, that Nico didn't shrug him off of him while Percy was still in attendance. "Yeah, maybe. But if being mowed down in an RPG shoot off means he doesn't do it in real life, then that's fine with me."

"You say that like it's actually happened before," Nico muttered.

"Hasn't it?"

"When have I ever mowed you down in real life?"

"Try last week after we fought that weird-arse zombie with the purple hair and then you challenged me. What do you call that, exactly?"

"I call that me coaching you into using a sword as a proper weapon rather than that handful of sticks that you throw at people."

"You mean a bow and arrows?" Percy asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Of course."

Percy laughed as he turned and made his way towards the cabin door. As he slipped his coat back onto his shoulders, Will caught his eye and the distinct mouthing of _"whipped"_ that preceded his departure through the door.

Will didn't dispute the suggestion, calling only a casual "Later" to Percy's farewell as the door to the cabin clicked shut. He didn't dispute because he considered it more than a little bit true. Yeah, he probably was a bit whipped. And it was probably a bit pathetic too, maybe a little embarrassing, and he should probably tone it down.

But then he would think about the hours that he and Nico were practically joined at the hip, or that in Capture the Flag or combat training Nico would always have his back regardless of the fact that he claimed time and time again that he intended to leave him to face his opponents head on so he could 'get some proper practice'. He would remember that out of the vast number of potential companions that offered themselves Nico would only ever partied with Will in multiplayer games, and that Will was the only one spared the full weight of Nico's seething wrath when he'd beat him in his early days of learning a new game.

And he would remember that no one else on earth, Olympus or the Underworld was able to get close enough to Nico to kiss without being kicked into Tartarus. And no one else was kissed back.

Will smiled at his screen, at the little helmeted avatar that was his boyfriend as he gunned down another potential assailant. He liked to think that maybe, just slightly, Nico might be a bit whipped too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Please leave a comment to let me know what you think! I love to hear from you :D


	2. First Attempts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: The time Will’s overthinking skills exceeded expectations and necessity. Again.

All things told, the three chariots were a little pretentious. Heavy polished gold reflecting the morning sunlight in scattering rays, they were like a spotlight announcing the arrival of the Romans. The pegasus were just as pretentious, glossy white with multihued feathering on their wings that glowed almost as brilliantly as the chariots they pulled.

"Three guesses who that is."

Nico glanced sidelong at Will, who was staring up at the approaching guests with the same mild curiosity that the rest of the surrounding demigods did. Curiosity and just a little apprehension, the latter of which was absent from those around them. He shook his head. "Don't need three guesses."

"Mm. Hazel and Frank?"

Nico nodded. "Probably Reyna, too."

"I count five people all up," Kayla muttered, fingers poking the air as she physically counted them.

"Jason Iris-messaged me yesterday saying that he was getting a lift with Reyna on the way through," Percy said from behind them. "I think him and Piper are probably a bit home sick for camp."

"We all get like that sometimes," Annabeth nodded at his side. Nico's glance towards her confirmed his suspicions that she more than sympathised with the sentiment. "Still, LA's a little out of the way coming from San Francisco to New York."

"You honestly think Reyna would mind going out of her way for Jason?" Percy asked.

"True."

They fell into silence as all attention turned once more towards the chariots. They weren't alone in watching the approach – most of the demigods from camp had paused in their sword practice, in their archery and their rock-climbing, in the vicious and often brutal games of volleyball to turn upwards. Even the Apollo cabin members practicing their instruments had lowered mouthpieces from lips and dropped fingers from strings to turn their attention towards the approaching Romans.

Nico felt a small smile threaten to touch his lips. He hadn't seen his sister, nor any of his other friends, for months. It was the first time since the New Year two weeks before that they'd visited, but even before that Nico hadn't seen all that much of them. They'd made an attempt to meet once a month, but oftentimes one or two of their number couldn't make it. Everyone was simply too busy, or two widespread. Even Jason and Piper, who had claimed themselves more partial to the Greek camp rather than the Roman one, were currently spending most of their time with Piper's dad in Los Angeles. Nico wouldn't admit it aloud – it would be far too embarrassing to do so – but he'd actually missed them. Even with Percy and Annabeth visiting most weekends, and even with the companionability of the children of Apollo, it was different, nice in a different kind of way. In their more recent quest to Greece, they'd shared something that couldn't be shaken by distance and time apart.

As Nico watched, he couldn't help but roll his eyes as, in one chariot in particular, a figure with distinctly blonde hair bodily clambered over the side and, with apparent disregard for his safety and wellbeing, jumped from the height of nearly half a kilometre and rocketed to the ground. It was a testament to how well Jason had assimilated and been embraced by Camp Half-Blood that most watchers sighed in fond exasperation rather than gasped and clicked their tongues in worry.

Jason plummeted twice as fast to the ground as the chariots soaring behind him and hit the ground at a run not twenty feet from where Nico and his friends stood. He jogged across the distance between them, grin plastered on his face and readjusting his glasses, puffing foggy clouds with each breath. "Hey, guys!"

Naturally it was Percy who stepped forwards first. They wrapped one another in a friendly, one-armed hug, each slapping one another's backs with affection that had blossomed between them that was reminiscent of childhood friends rather than acquaintances of less than six months.

"Hey, Jase, long time!"

"Tell me about it. Man, I've missed New York, I can tell you."

"New York's missed you too. We need our regular dose of Sparky to add some zest to the scenery." The pair of them grinned at one another as though they'd shared a fine joke.

"Oh, please," Annabeth sighed, stepping towards Jason. She was smiling herself, however, when she took Percy's place to offer him a brief hug. "How've you been, Jason?"

"Yeah, not too bad. Just missing home, I guess." He grinned widely, without a trace of that wistfulness his words suggested he'd felt. "Tell you what, it's warmer in LA, though."

"That's because it's further south."

"No shit, Perce," Jason said. Percy only smiled, disregarding his sarcasm. It was sickeningly friendly enough to make Nico roll his eyes once more.

By that point, the chariots had descended at a distance and, with various demigods dutifully stepping forwards to offer their assistance to their guests, the rest of the arrivals touched their feet to the ground and made their way through the snow towards where Jason was already standing. Nico returned a smile to those that Hazel and Reyna offered him, but hardly got a chance to do more before the excitement of welcome was upon them all.

Hugs were exchanged – much to Nico's disgruntlement, at least in every instance except Hazel's – and pleasantries right behind them. Pleasantries that faded into sincere questions of "What have you been up to?" and "I'm surprised you got here so fast. How long are you staying?" Nico greeted each of his friends with his usual initial awkwardness that faded when that awkwardness was recognised by his friends and thence disregarded. Even Frank, who Nico had never had all that much to do with outside of being Hazel's boyfriend, offered a warm word of greeting.

The rest of the demigods of camp, those that surrounded what had once made up the core of the quest to fight Gaea, offered their own greetings, waving and smiling and genuinely welcoming the Romans and returning Greeks. Fionn, always bubbly and overflowing with words, was the first to dive into the mix, and everyone else followed her lead.

Except for Will, Nico noticed, but then Will… Nico already knew the reason for Will's hesitancy.

"It's so good to see everyone," Piper was saying, as usual her voice having that resonance that seemed to be heard by everyone in attendance, regardless of how far away they stood. "Jason's right, it's really been too long. We've missed camp. Seriously."

"And everyone in it," Jason continued. He swept his beaming smile around his audience with what Nico saw as being just slightly more emphasis directed towards his closer friends. "What with all of us together, it's almost like –"

He cut himself off abruptly, and like a splinter of awkwardness pricking painfully in the air, the unspoken words, that which had nearly tumbled forth, drew him to a jarring quietness. Silenced everyone, in fact. _Almost like old times,_ Nico thought. _Except for the fact that we're missing one_.

Nico knew Leo wasn't dead. Even though he'd felt him die, he knew he wasn't _dead_. Not anymore at least, however that was possible and despite the fact that Nico had been _sure_ he'd died. But that knowledge wasn't all that reassuring to his friends, to those who missed the quirky son of Hephaestus and mourned his absence even if it wasn't a complete loss. Nico was as annoyed as he was saddened by that reality. If Leo wasn't dead, then where the hell was he? Didn't he realise that he had people waiting for him, people who wondered after his sudden disappearance in a display of self-sacrifice?

The hush continued until, with a loud clearing of his throat, Percy plastered his smile back upon his face. He spoke with exaggerated jubilance. "So! I think we were all going to head up to the dining pavilion for lunch before you guys all came and crashed our party. Anyone interested?"

The surfacing relief on Jason's face was reflected in the enthusiastic chorus of agreement from everyone else who leapt upon the distraction from their momentary melancholy. Like a rising wave, the sea of demigods seemed to move as one towards the pavilion, the stragglers who hadn't quite made it to their meeting point running to catch up. There were dozens of them altogether, a veritable sea of teens. Nico found himself between Will – who still wore an expression of uncharacteristic apprehension and hesitancy, and Reyna, who had a slightly exasperated and yet faintly relieved expression upon her face. Considering she was the traditional Roman amongst the ranks of Grecians, she was handling herself rather well. Almost comfortably.

Quite unexpectedly, Nico found his hand caught by Will's. He wasn't sure which of them had even reached for the other. He didn't pull it free immediately despite his natural urge, and mostly because, even through the tugging confusion of the loud and the suddenly hungry, he saw his expression. That apprehension had shifted to open wariness, almost concern.

Nico was grateful for the noise around them as he leaned into Will to convey his quiet words loud enough. Will was being an idiot but Nico didn't have the heart to reprimand him for it. Not in this instance, at least. "Stop overthinking things."

"I'm not overthinking things," Will muttered, though even his tone sounds guilty. Still wary, but guilty now too.

"Yes, you are. Why you're worried about this is beyond me anyway –"

"How is it 'beyond you'?" Will hissed in reply. "I feel like I'm meeting my boyfriend's family for the first time or something."

"My family? They're not my _family_ – well, Hazel is, but still –"

"They're as good as," Will muttered, casting a glance over Nico's shoulder towards Reyna. From his brief start and the nervous smile that appeared only briefly upon his face, Nico suspected that Reyna was looking right back at him. When he spoke again, his voice was barely audible. "It doesn't take a genius to see that they're really protective of you –"

"Good thing you're not a genius then."

"- and I'm practically shitting myself meeting them for the first time."

Nico heaved a sigh. "Will, it's not the first time you're meeting them. You _have_ met them before. Several times, in fact."

"Yeah, but I wasn't your boyfriend then."

"Would it make you feel better to know that I'm pretty sure at least Jason suspected something?" From the brief spark of terror that flashed across Will's face, it evidently didn't. Nico shook his head. "Okay, forget I said that."

What had happened to the usually so easy, amicable Will? This sort of nervousness wasn't like him at all. Or at least, it wasn't _usual_ of him. Will did tend to overthink things sometimes, Nico had grown to realise. It was how that whole debacle and misunderstanding had arisen when Nico had visited Eve for the first time at Christmas.

Taking a deep breath, he released it in another sigh. _Okay, try a different tactic_. "How is this any different from with Percy and Annabeth? We had to tell them, right?" _Why is it_ me _reassuring him? I never reassure anyone of anything. He's usually so okay with this sort of thing!_

Will was shaking his head fervently. "Yeah, but it was different. It was _different_ with them."

"Why?"

"Because they're Percy and Annabeth! I've known them for years and I knew they wouldn't care – or at least that they wouldn't hate me –"

"Why would any of my friends hate you because we're dating?"

Will gave Nico a look as though he were stupid. "Um, maybe because they're a bunch of monster-killing demigods, some of the most powerful that have _ever_ been born, and they're so overprotective of their friends that it's frankly a little bit weird."

"Hey, that's my friends you're talking about."

"Yeah! That's the problem!"

Nico shook his head. "That doesn't even make any sense. You realise that _you're_ a powerful, monster-killing demigod too, right?"

"And massively out of their league," Will said slowly, deliberately, as though such a fact was even remotely relevant.

Nico opened his mouth to reply and found that he couldn't. He had no idea what he could say to ease Will from his narrow-minded neuroticism. Any arguments he would have considered had already been said. Well, except for…

"Does it even matter if they care we're dating? Or, if in some utterly improbable alternate universe, they wouldn't like you?" Will's expression became horrified once more and Nico gave up. No, that hadn't worked either. Nico gave up and just squeezed Will's hand crushingly in his own.

They made their way towards the dining pavilion amidst the raucous bellows and laughter of their fellow campers, breaking off as they stepped beneath the shelter as each fell to the designated tables of their godly parents. Before Jason, Piper, Hazel, Frank and Reyna could even consider doing the same – something that would have been a little difficult for Reyna – Percy raised his voice as he turned towards their small group.

"Nope, you lot, you're all coming to sit at my table with me."

"Are we even allowed to do that?" Piper asked.

"No, not really." Percy shrugged and flashed a grin towards Nico, who replied with a blankly condescending stare as he anticipated what would follow. "But Nico's sort of set a precedent in that regard, so under extenuating circumstances the formalities of table seating is rendered void."

"Temporarily," Annabeth added, as though such a feature was integral for inclusion. "It's not an 'all the time' thing for most of us." Then she too flashed Nico a glance that very obviously excluded him from the 'most'.

To Jason's questions of "Why is that?" and Hazel's "Then where do you sit, Nico?" that caused Will to tense like a statue at his side, they followed Percy to his table. Nico locked his hand even tighter around Will's fingers, perhaps the first time he had been the one to initiate anything even vaguely encouraging a handhold, and tugged him alongside him before he could escape. Will dropped to sitting with the rigidity of a tin man and a marked hesitancy that left him as the last to take his seat out of them all. He gained a few curious glances, and one faintly knowing one from Jason, but largely everyone seemed to just accept his presence.

Nico rolled his eyes at his boyfriend's antics and, maintaining his captive lock of fingers beneath the table, turned deliberately to talk to Reyna who had positioned herself alongside him once more. She was certainly less exasperating to talk to than Will, who would likely only blurt out his nervousness should Nico attempt to draw him into conversation anyway.

The wood nymphs arrived with an array of plates tailored to everyone's specific tastes and they fell to eating amidst talking, between Jason stealing one of Percy's blue sandwiches and Piper nearly choking on a corn chip as she laughed at something Annabeth said. Nico did try to talk to Will just after their lunches arrived but, though he offered a sickly sort of smile of thanks for the attempt, Will remained close-lipped.

Honestly. He was being ridiculous. Nico went back to talking to Reyna instead.

He liked Reyna. They were close in a different kind of way to how Nico was with the rest of his friends, and not because they shared that much in common or were particularly affectionate with one another. It was probably that, as well as their brief exchanges of vulnerability to one another, which drew them closer.

"… and I wouldn't mind so much, except that she always feels the need to question my orders and voice her opinions even if she doesn't necessarily think that they're _wrong_." Reyna sighed, picking at the last of her burrito and shaking her head. "It's infuriating. I almost wish you were back in Camp Jupiter to back me up."

"Except I've never backed you up in the past anyway," Nico pointed out. "Lets face it, I was basically a selective mute in counsel meetings."

Reyna flashed him a crooked smile. "Yes, well, I would hope that you'd change your tune if I asked you to."

"Think about what you're asking exactly. You say that Nina's a thorn in your side because she feels the need to comment on everything that you say? Why would I want to say anything, then?"

"True." Reyna sighed again. "I can't say I blame you. You should visit New Rome again though, Nico. Your absence is very much noticed."

"By you, maybe. And not as much since Hazel's been the primary representative of the children of Pluto," Nico replied, nodding towards his sister across the table. Hazel smiled at him with her usual open affection; he'd noticed her listening for the past few minutes.

"Maybe, but I've not quite managed the intimidation factor that you do so well."

"He's a natural at it," Will murmured from his side, the one of the few times he'd spoken throughout the entirety of lunch. Nico glanced at him sidelong enough to see that he had eased somewhat with the casualness of the conversations around him. Or maybe that was Frank's doing; Nico had heard them talking, if only briefly. Something about archery from the sound of it. At least now he appeared in a slightly better mood. He was even smiling a little bit.

 _There,_ Nico thought approvingly. _Whenever Will gets into a nervous funk, I'll just whack him with archery talk, then. Thanks for the heads up, Frank._

"Reyna's right, though," Hazel continued, sparing only a brief, curious glance for Will that caused him to tense once more, much to Nico's revamped exasperation. "You should come back to Camp Jupiter. It would be nice to see more of you."

"I'd think that there would be plenty of us that would be more than ready to request you join their legions," Frank added around a mouthful of burger. "You know people still talk about how cool it is that you can summon zombies and stuff."

"Well, I guess that's better than here," Nico muttered. He still got the occasional wary glances sometimes, and it was like a cyclical renewal of uneasiness that temporarily infected the camp whenever the story of the Zombie Dinner was relived. It would always fade, though the uncertainty of the other demigods remained just on the periphery. People would always be scared of death. Hell, even Nico –

"You're not – you're not going to leave, are you?" Will abruptly blurted out in a whisper, breaking into Nico's thoughts. Not loudly enough to be heard by anyone who wasn't straining to listen, except for perhaps Reyna who Nico saw in his periphery raised a speculative eyebrow.

Nico glanced towards him. "What? Leaving? No, I'm –"

"Because I thought you said you wouldn't. I mean, I just thought you'd –" Will cut his whispered words off, frowning in an entirely different kind of nervousness, of worry.

Nico shook his head, pinching Will's wrist that he still held under the table. "No, I'm not leaving, you stupid Light Bulb." Raising his voice, he turned back to Hazel. "Maybe I could come and visit you guys sometime? It would probably be easier than the other way around."

Hazel beamed and agreed readily. The rest of lunch was spent discussing through her chattering excitement the logistics, of which Nico was only a minimal participant, and ignoring the return of Will's nervousness that slowly lessened once more when he talked himself out of his foolishness. Nico was quite relieved that he didn't have to attempt to coax it out of him instead; he seemed to do more harm than good when he tried.

Lunch tapered off slowly, most of the surrounding demigods with it when they'd had their fill of watching the new arrivals and occasionally calling out questions or words of greeting. At Annabeth's suggestion that they make a move from the tables to more comfortable seating than the admittedly uncomfortable dining pews, they rose as one and followed Percy and Annabeth towards Hestia's hearth. It was that or to one of the more neutral cabins, and as far as Nico was concerned, none of the cabins would exactly be considered comfortable by _every_ one.

As one, they fell easily back into sitting, Jason and Percy both casually leasing the way by sprawling out in what would have been snow angels had not the warmth of the fireplace melted a ring about it, exposing the feeble winter grass below. The rest of them lowered themselves to the ground with markedly less casual enthusiasm, Reyna even going so far as to spread her praetor's cloak on the ground to sit upon before daintily pulling her gloves off and unwrapping her scarf. Nico couldn't blame the de-layering; Hestia's warmth was certainly radiant.

It would have been simplistically perfect, except for the fact that Will, being the stubborn, idiot mule that he was, dug his heels into the ground and refused to step up to the wobbly ring of demigods surrounding the fire. Nico, his hand still locked on Will's wrist, was nearly jerked from his feet when he moved to join his friends. He glanced behind him with a barely suppressed grumble of exasperation. "What? What's wrong now?"

Will was staring at where Percy and Jason were indeed actually making snow angels – they'd scooted back towards the thin blanket of snow just beyond the ring of the hearth and were cackling together about something or other while Annabeth and Piper pointedly ignored them – and visibly swallowed. "I really don't feel comfortable with this."

"You don't want to hang out with me and the people I consider my friends?"

"It's not that –"

"Actually, I think it is that exactly."

"No, it's not. It's just…" Will turned his worried frown upon Nico. "This is really kind of embarrassing. I feel like we should maybe tell them, but then at the same time I don't know whether that would be too assuming, and I don't know if they'll actually approve –"

"What is it with you and looking for their approval?" Nico said, shaking his head. "Why would it make a difference if they did or didn't? And what would even make you think they wouldn't approve? They liked you _before_ we were boyfriends."

"Let's face it, Nico, they didn't even know me. It's all about first impressions –"

"Which, despite the fact that you've been strung like a bow string, you haven't made a bad one of."

"Look, I just know from experience that –"

Nico rolled his eyes, tugging on Will's arm for a moment. It didn't move him an inch. _He really is like a stubborn fucking mule._ "Experience? Really? With all of your past boyfriends and all?"

"I meant with _my_ mum," Will said, a slight flush rising in his cheeks. Nico marvelled that he really was quite so unhinged. "I always found it weird when she started dating someone new –"

"Well, I'm sure our children will be fine. They can handle it."

"I wasn't insinuating they were like our kids."

"Really? Because that's sort of what it sounded like."

Will heaved a sigh, reaching a hand up to scrub at the back of his head. "This really isn't coming out right."

"No, it's not," Nico agreed. "Because there is no right way for it to come out. This," Nico leant towards him slightly, reaching up to flick Will in the middle of his forehead, "is all in your head. Honestly, do you think that I cared when Hazel and Frank finally told everyone that they were actually dating? Or Jason and Piper? Or literally anyone batted an eyelid when Percy and Annabeth officially admitted they crushed on each another?"

"That's different," Will began.

"Only because this time you're on the other side of it."

"Nico –"

But Nico wouldn't hear anymore of it. With a hard tug, he jerked Will forwards after him, drew him towards the space next to Reyna – they appeared to have both silently agreed to sit alongside one another in every instance – and drew them both down to sitting. With deliberate volume, he turned a narrowed-eyed glare upon Will and announced, "For Gods' sake, Will, you're my boyfriend and if I want you to bloody well join us then you're allowed to."

Then, ignoring any potential responses his friends made, he turned away from Will, deliberately slumped backwards so that his back was propped against Will's shoulder, and turned his attention to Reyna. Reyna, who was so evidently biting back a smile that she should have just let it show anyway.

It was embarrassing, a big part of Nico whined. Mortifyingly embarrassing to perform in such a display before anyone. It wasn't in Nico's repertoire to make overt announcements – he didn't want everyone knowing his private business, and certainly not that he actually _liked_ someone.

But it had been necessary. Because Will was a ball of nerves, and he needed to get the source of that nervousness out of the way. To smother the flame, as it were.

Nico did not see the momentary surprise that flashed across Hazel's face as she glanced between him and Will. Surprise that quickly faded into a wide, vibrant smile. He equally didn't see Frank's immediate acceptance of his words, as though he'd voiced nothing more important than the condition of the weather, nor Reyna's continued quivering of lips and deliberate attempt to look anywhere but at Nico. He definitely did not hear Piper say to a distinctly self-satisfied Jason, "How did I not know about this? How did _I_ not realise when you did?" or Percy's reply of, "Don't worry, Piper, I didn't realise until Annabeth told me either", and Annabeth's subsequent smug grin.

No, Nico very definitely did not see any of that. He deliberately slumped into his seat, shoved aside the incident alongside his regard for Will's nervousness, and lifted his gaze to meet Reyna's when she finally turned towards him. Her lips still trembled slightly, however, and actually broke into a smile when Nico pointedly turned his gaze towards them.

"So… just had a thought about what you were saying at lunch," Reyna began, drawing Nico from his attempts at ignoring the rest of his friends. "About keeping quiet at every possible instance."

Nico suppressed the urge to roll his eyes at the _very_ deliberate insinuation of her words. "Maybe not always. Sometimes I guess you just need to say something. Regardless of what other people think. Because it needs to be said for… _to_ some people."

A slow smile finally stretched across Reyna's face and Nico could have sworn that for a brief second her gaze flickered over his shoulder to Will at his back. Will, who had actually been drawn by Frank into another discussion, who appeared to have abruptly deflated from his pedestal of nerves, and had even slung and arm over Nico's shoulder.

For once, Nico didn't shrug it off. Not immediately, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you, gorgeous people who commented last chapter! Thank you so much!! So many lovely comments - I can't even say how may times I squealed over such absolutely gorgeous words.  
> Sorry for the lateness of the update. I'll try and be a bit more prompt next chapter. We'll try for under a week this time :)


	3. First Fights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: The time Will was right but Nico was, apparently, righter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Okay, just a heads up. This chapter takes place AFTER the Trials of Apollo. No, I am not a precog and I do not know what will happen in the series, so speculate that this happens about a year or two after the fight against Gaea. I think that's a pretty reasonable estimation. As such *spoiler* Leo is back and well again, and no, I will not go into what happened in Albania. No one knows and likely will never know *wink wink*.
> 
> Enjoy the chapter!

Will and Nico bantered and argued. They teased and bickered. They pulled jibes at one another's expense, and words were spoken in sarcasm more often than not.

But the first fight, the first real fight… Kayla still said that she had nightmares about it sometimes because it was simply so explosive. Apparently the very cabin had seemed to shake, though Will couldn't recall it doing such. But then he had been somewhat distracted.

It started out as a simple conversation. Well, maybe not _just_ a simple conversation. Truthfully, it began with a disgruntled – no, an _infuriated_ – questioning, and deny though Will did at first, he knew he was the one that started it. The one who had so abruptly escalated the scene.

And, almost predictably, it was about Nico's shadow travelling. Or at least, his shadow travelling had a bit to do with it. A little bit.

Nico had taken to visiting Camp Jupiter in New Rome every second weekend to see his sister. They had grown closer since the first time they'd met one another, and though Nico had admitted that he wasn't sure they would ever really see each other as true _siblings_ , he seemed to like her company. It reminded Will of how he felt with his own siblings; they weren't _quite_ brothers and sisters, despite their godly parentage, but their bonds were profound nonetheless.

Apparently, as far as Will could discern without having ever actually visited the Roman city in San Francisco, Nico was something of a welcomed figure there these days. The positivity of his reception was, according to Hazel in the visits that she made to Camp Half-Blood, for a number of reasons in particular: one, that his strength as a demigod was respected as strength evidently was in the Romans. Two, that he was on a very – almost strangely – friendly basis with Reyna Avila Ramirez-Arellano, the praetor of the legion. And three, because he wasn't quite as disagreeable as he one had been. Not quite.

Will would be lying if he didn't take credit at least a little bit for that third one. It wasn't only him that presumed as much – everyone had noted, out of Nico's hearing, of course, how he'd changed since the near resurrection of Gaea and the attack of the Romans what now seemed so long ago.

Will wasn't usually so disgruntled about his boyfriend's trips across America. He knew he wouldn't be able to stop him from going even had he wanted to, and he didn't. Not really. Or at least, not that much. True, it worried him whenever Nico shadow travelled, and he didn't like it when he was absented for so long – two days felt much longer when it was spent waiting, despite filling ones hours with worthy distractions – but he never disputed it. Not much, anyway. He liked Hazel well enough and could understand Nico's desire to be around someone just a little like him. He only regretted that it wasn't _Will_ that could fill that space.

Unfortunately, this time was worse. Worse for a number of reasons. When Nico stepped into cabin seven the morning of his return, glancing over his shoulder as though talking to a passer-by as he entered, Will was nearly quivering with pent up anger. He'd hardly slept the night before because _some_ one had been a bloody, inconsiderate idiot.

He was lurching up from the couch before Nico had even shut the door. The couch, because Will hadn't bothered to take himself to his bed the previous night, having been worried about his _stupid_ boyfriend. That worry only mounted when he saw the nearly healed cut slicing across Nico's cheek, and his weary paleness – damn him, he was just starting to get some permanent colour back into him! – and the bandage around two fingers of his right hand. Will would have known they were broken even without looking at them – he could feel it. Nico stopped barely a step into the cabin, eyes drawing to Will's as though magnetised, and though he didn't appear unnerved, discomforted, or even mildly surprised, it was evident that he perceived Will's anger. His hands slipped into the pockets of his jacket and he simply waited.

Will fought for a moment to calm himself, to moderate his response that threatened to burst from him in a thunder of raging accusations. When he did speak, he knew he hadn't quite managed. His voice wavered just slightly. "Where've you been?"

Around the cabin, the slowly awakening children of Apollo seemed to sense the descending mood. Gradual awakenings paused in the act of stretching and yawning, of swinging legs over the sides of beds and rising to feet. Will barely even noticed that he had an audience. His attention was focused entirely upon Nico as Nico stared back at him, utterly blank-faced.

A long pause was followed by a deceptively monotonous reply. "You know where I went. I always go –"

"To Camp Jupiter, yeah, I know that." Will fought a losing battle to keep his hands from curling into fists. "You always go every second weekend to see Hazel. I know that."

"You do know that," Nico agreed. Somehow, despite the complete lack of change to his tone, he sounded faintly accusing.

"What I don't know is why you come back on Wednesday morning, just strolling in as though nothing's different, when you _always_ come back on Sunday."

"There's a reason for that."

"Oh, then, please, do enlighten me." Will couldn't suppress his glare. He was angry, _so_ angry that his fingernails dug painfully into his palms in an effort to restrain their inclination to grab Nico's shoulders and shake him like a ragdoll.

Slowly, Nico folded his arms. It wasn't exactly a defensive posture, more objectionable than anything, but if nothing else Will recognised it as being a very clear gesture of Not Happy. "I had to help Hazel out with a quest. They were in trouble."

"I know that. After I Iris-messaged Reyna, she told me."

"Good for you, you know how to Iris-message. So what's your problem?"

"My problem," Will ground out, "is that you _disappeared_ , Nico. You and Hazel and Frank and half of their cohort just disappeared and Reyna didn't know where you went. No one could get in contact with you – I didn't know if you were dead or injured or – or –"

Will had to cut himself off as he began to stutter. He pressed his lips together and pinned Nico with his glare, hoping the unspoken demand to _"Explain yourself_ " was loud enough to be heard.

Before him, Nico became visibly stony. His arms remained folded tightly across his chest and though his face blanked his eyes grew hooded in what Will recognised as being his 'objectionable' expression. Pissed off? Yes, he was probably pretty pissed off. Unlikely as much as Will, though, who was barely maintaining a grasp upon his roiling anger.

"Well, obviously I'm not dead."

" _Obviously,_ but I didn't know that for the past two days," Will growled.

"I wasn't able to get a message off to you. Iris-message or phone call."

"Oh, you couldn't take a second out of your busy schedule, your unplanned and unexpected quest, to tell your _boyfriend_ that you weren't lying in a ditch somewhere with monsters picking out your eyes?"

"Wonderful use of descriptive words there, Will," Nico muttered, almost too quietly to be heard. "Are you always so creative when you're upset?"

"Shut the fuck up, Nico. I'm not upset, I'm _angry_." _And maybe just a little bit upset_ , Will added to himself, but he didn't give Nico the satisfaction of admitting his correctness. "You didn't tell me you were going, just up and left without a word because you _felt_ like it –"

"Yeah, doesn't feel too great, does it?" Nico narrowed his eyes. "Funny that."

Will blinked for a moment, shaken briefly from his rising fury before reasserting his glare once more. "What in Hades are you talking about?"

"You know, you're acting very entitled about _me_ just up and leaving to help someone out on some quest when you did exactly the same before me."

"What are you -?"

"Disappearing for half a week to go out and help your dad doesn't ring any bells?" Nico raised his eyebrows pointedly, affixing Will with his unblinking stare. The hardness of his face could have been carved from stone.

No one in the cabin seemed to breathe, and Will was as breathless as his siblings. Confusion momentarily dampened his anger. "What are you going on about? With Apollo –?"

"You buggered off to go and help your dad try and find his lyre without telling me until _afterwards_ where you were going –"

"That? That wasn't a bloody quest, Nico. That was going on a – a – a fucking treasure hunt. We barely encountered a monster throughout the entire thing. And it's not like I could help it. It wasn't really even _Apollo_ who needed help, it was Lester and –"

"They're the same fucking person, Will."

"No, they're not! Lester's bloody incapable half the time and would trip over his own feet if someone wasn't around to point them out to him –"

"Apollo had already regained his godly status by that point. He had _no_ excuse for his incompetence."

"That doesn't even matter!" Will burst out. "I told you I was going –"

"You didn't. You didn't tell me _anything_ until you got back."

"I told Fionn to give you a message –"

"Which she didn't deliver."

"Because she was attacked by monsters on the way back to camp!"

"You're just making up excuses for yourself." Nico was openly scowling now.

"Making up – wait, what the hell? We're talking about _you_ here, Nico, not me." Will's hands were trembling fists at his sides. "We're talking about _you_ and the fact that _you_ didn't tell me where you were going when you were obviously heading into a dangerous quest –"

"It was hardly even dangerous –"

"Oh, so you're broken fingers aren't hardly an injury, then?"

"They're nearly healed," Nico muttered, tucking his right hand deeper into the crook of his elbow as if to bury it further from sight. "It was mostly just an accident, anyway."

"That's not the point!" Will felt the abrupt need to pull his hair out. His hand rose to rake along his scalp, locking onto his curls as he hissed out his frustration. "The point is that you _always_ go off and do dangerous shit without even thinking about those dangers –"

"I do _not_."

"Oh, really? So all those times you've taken off halfway through the night –"

"To go to the Underworld, which isn't even dangerous, you idiot."

"Or when you suddenly up and left to go to LA because Jason mentioned something that _might_ have been slightly concerning and you wound up with a broken arm."

"It was barely even broken –"

"Are we going to forget about the absolute stupidity that urged you to shadow travel the Athena Parthenon from bloody Greece a couple of years ago? You nearly killed yourself!"

Nico's eyes flashed dangerously. "You said you wouldn't nag me about that anymore."

"I'm 'nagging' because you keep doing stupid shit!" Will realised his voice had risen in volume, was nearly a shout, but he didn't cared. "I'm 'nagging' because even though you pass out nearly every time you do it you still keep on shadow travelling."

"I do _not_ nearly pass out every time –"

"Are we going to just overlook the fact that the few times you've slept for more than twelve hours like a _normal_ teenager are when you exhaust yourself from travelling that way? You know why you sleep so well, Nico? 'Cause you nearly fucking kill yourself!"

Nico's face had dropped what remaining colour it had retained. He stared at Will, unspeaking, blank-faced but for the seething fury in his narrowed eyes. Will knew instantly that he'd overstepped, though whether it was in mentioning Nico's difficulty sleeping, in spitting and spluttering over his shadow travel, or at the mention of death in general which could invoke nonchalance just as easily as anger or flight, Will wasn't sure.

But he wasn't done. Will knew he'd overstepped, but his anger, his frustration and yes, his fear was blurting forth in an unrestrainable gush that he couldn't stem. He was barely even aware of his warily brothers and sisters. "You always, _always_ disregard looking after yourself, and it fucking scares the hell out of me! Do you have _any_ idea how frustrating it is when you up and disappear somewhere and I don't even know if you managed to come out the other end of your shadows alive? Do you know what it's like to see your boyfriend come face-planting through your door because he's nearly killed himself somehow?

"No, you don't. You have no fucking idea because it's always _me_ who patches people up, it's _me_ who sits there next to _you_ when you're sitting there pretending you don't feel how much your leg hurts because it's nearly been torn off, or that you're not worried that you can't feel your fingers because of frostbite when _I_ can feel how much it hurts but you just fucking ignore it! And then we never even mention it again because you don't really care if you lose an arm or a leg, because you don't really care if you hurt yourself, or get lost somewhere in the shadows, or in the Underworld, or get dragged off to Tartarus again, but you know what, Nico? _I_ care. For some stupid, ungodly reason, _I_ care, and you make me so bloody angry and _frustrated_ because you don't even seem to realise it and – and – and could you just fucking stop with your bloody shadow travel and think to send me a fucking message every once in a while? Huh?"

Will was panting by the end of his tirade, panting and faintly dizzy from the throbbing of blood to his head. His hands were balled so tightly into fists that his fingers creaked and he knew he physically trembled with the force of his anger. He stared at Nico unblinkingly as heated rage rolled off his shoulders.

Nico stared back. He stared, as cold and expressionless as he was at his best. No, that was wrong. He was even more expressionless, and that fact, that realisation, would have probably alerted Will to the surfacing issue if he'd been more self-aware.

He wasn't. He was still angry, still _furious_ , and he just wanted Nico to admit that he'd been wrong, to obligingly promise not to act so recklessly, and to fucking realise how much Will cared. Unfortunately, none of those wants appeared to be rising from the horizon.

Nico stared for a moment longer. Then, with a deliberate sweep of his gaze, he scanned the room and the silent watchers briefly before resting his attention back on Will. " _Fanculo_ ," was all he said, all he spat, before he spun on his heel and burst through the cabin door.

Will knew what that word meant. He probably would have been able to guess even if he didn't know for certain. But more than the meaning of the word itself, it was the fact that Nico had spoken in Italian that struck him. He only ever slipped back into his mother tongue when he was so detached from the moment that he literally forgot to speak in English. Like when he was utterly confused or absolutely, horrendously, chillingly furious.

The door slammed shut behind him with a bang. Will was left to slowly deflate from his anger – somehow, oh so slowly, and with as much pain as calming – in the ensuing silence that followed.

* * *

 

Nico had disappeared. Not simply secreted himself somewhere beneath a rock or something but physically disappeared. Will didn't even realise he'd vanished at first, and in some ways that only made it worse.

When Nico had departed the cabin, Will had struggled with the conflicting urges to race after him and knock him over the back of the head, to kick one of the cabin walls down, and to sink to the floor in exhaustion after his explosive rant. He did none of those things, but simply settled for slumping onto the back of the couch with a heavy sigh. Slowly, incrementally, the pounding in his ears, the headache in his temples and the anger that turned his vision too bright faded. He was left with nothing but exhaustion and the shadow of that anger, alongside a new kind of irritation that Nico had turned tail and just left. Again.

The other members of Apollo's cabin eased into movement only slowly. Like marionettes with their strings hesitantly jostled into motion, they eased back into the usual readying routine that engaged them every morning. Will didn't turn his head to meet anyone's gaze, but he could feel the wary attentiveness of too many eyes upon him. He didn't want to look up, didn't want to face the confusion, the reprimand even, that would likely greet him.

Austin was the only one who approached him. He slinked up to his side so quietly that Will didn't realise he had moved from his bedside until the back of the couch beside him sunk slightly under his friend's weight. Will spared Austin a sidelong glance, his fingers digging into the back of the couch.

Austin only stared at him for a moment in silence, face frowning slightly in thoughtful consideration. When he did eventually speak it was with his usual slow, calm tone. "So. What are you going to do?"

Will turned towards him. His anger had faded, but annoyance took its place. Annoyance at his half-siblings for bearing witness to his admittedly shameful display, at himself for shouting at all. He didn't shout. He never shouted. He was angry at Nico too, both for leaving with barely a moment spared to curse Will as much as for the reasons that Will had accused him of earlier.

He believed them. He wholeheartedly believed them. Will never had any intention of revealing that belief to Nico, but it was true. Nico was too reckless with his own life, with his health, and it was terrifying enough for Will when he was at his side as they fought monsters because he knew that Nico would throw himself upon the enemy with barely a second thought. That was to say nothing of when Will wasn't there, when he didn't have his back, both with bow and arrow or sword and as a medic. It angered him how little Nico seemed to care about his general wellbeing in its entirety, angered as much as it saddened him because Nico _should_ care more, if only because Will wanted him to.

He was annoyed that Nico hadn't called him or told him where he was, absenting himself from the face of the earth for two whole days as though he didn't consider that anyone would notice his absence. It annoyed him that Nico persisted in shadow travelling after he'd experienced for himself time and time again how much damage it could do when he overused it. Most of all, however, it annoyed – no, it _angered_ Will that Nico didn't seem to realise just how much Will cared.

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair that Nico didn't realise, that he disregarded the possibility that Will would worry about him. Why should he have to keep silent on the matter of his own concern just because Nico would brush it aside as a passing pleasantry, or as insincere, or as simply confusing? Why couldn't he just understand?

Blinking, Will met Austin's open, questioning gaze flatly. "What am I going to do about what?"

"About Nico. You're just going to let him walk off in a strop? He seems like the sort of person who'd hold a grudge if you broke apart on a bad note."

With a sigh, Will dropped his gaze towards his feet. Austin was right. That was exactly the kind of thing that Nico would do – if Will didn't go after him and soothe his cold anger, then it would persist. Will didn't think that was fair either, that he was the one who had to go and apologise, to patch things up when really, if anyone was in the wrong it was Nico. But that was the reality of it. Unfortunately. And unlike Will's, Nico's anger wasn't the sort to mellow and retreat with time and contemplation. He was just stubborn like that.

Nodding, Will rubbed the heel of his palm over his forehead. He was still angry – no, he was still _annoyed_ – but he couldn't leave things as they were. "I know. I should go and get him."

"Do you know where he'd go?"

Will shrugged. "Maybe just to Hades' cabin. Or down by the lake. Or, I don't know, maybe he has enough sense to take himself to breakfast and eat something before he collapses. The idiot." Will shook his head, but his words were said without heat. He wasn't angry at Nico anymore, no more than he usually was – which was always just a little bit but similarly always buried beneath amusement and affection, laughter and determination and fond exasperation and torrents of joy. "I doubt it, but I'll check."

"We'll help you look if you'd like?" Kayla said, coming up to lean against the back of the couch at Austin's side.

Will shook his head, managing a feeble smile of gratitude. "It's okay. I should probably do it. I'm the one he'd be angry at if he still is."

"I'd guess he's still angry. Pissed off, actually, from the looks of him." Austin frowned. "I haven't seen him that angry for a while, actually. I'm surprised that skeletons weren't popping up all over the place and the floor cracking to pieces."

"You and me both," Will said with a sigh. Then he pushed himself off the back of the couch and made towards the door. "Thanks guys," he called over his shoulder. Then he raised his voice loud enough to be heard by everyone in the cabin. "Hey, everyone."

Motion froze once more as all eyes turned towards him expectantly. Will offered another sheepish smile. "Sorry about the early morning wake-up."

"It wasn't that early," someone called from the back of the room.

"Yeah, the sun's already up and everything," Fionn added, shrugging and offering a smile.

Will felt his sparking guilt become more pronounced at the easy acceptance of his cabin mates. He was cabin counsellor and supposed to be a role model for the younger kids. It was more than a little embarrassing that he'd erupted into what he was rapidly coming to the conclusion was a child-like tantrum. Bowing his head, as much to hide his grimace as in gratitude, he headed once more towards the door. "Thanks, guys. Seriously, sorry about that."

"Don't worry about it," Kayla said with a fond smile that Will perceived as being reminiscent of an older sister's, despite her being younger than him. Not that he'd had all that much personal experience in that regard, but it was what it felt like. "Just go and bring back our Goth Kid, okay? He's our mascot these days, you know?"

Will's returning smile was more genuine this time, and he left the cabin shaking his head. Mascot? Really? He was sure Nico would be thrilled about that.

His smile rapidly faded, however, as he set off about camp in search of his seething boyfriend and, with each step, overturned place after place absent of sons of Hades. The dining pavilion, Hades' cabin, the armoury and down by the lake near the boatshed. He scoured the grounds, from archery range to volleyball court to lava wall and even swung by the Big House to ask Chiron if he'd seen him.

Nothing.

That was when Will began to worry again. Which annoyed him – _why_ was it always Will who was the one worrying? – but that annoyance was trounced by concern. Nico had been injured, no matter that he'd brushed aside Will's concern for his health, and he'd been tired, likely from battle weariness as well as his shadow-travelling. What if he'd just collapsed somewhere? What if he was more injured than even Will's sixth sense awareness had picked up?

What if he'd shadow travelled again and his tiredness had ended it abruptly in disaster?

That last thought set his teeth on edge and Will's search became more frantic. He wouldn't have, would he? Surely he wouldn't be so stupid, regardless of how angry he was. He could seriously hurt himself! But Nico was a stubborn bastard and Will had rarely seen him so angry before. And never had that anger been directed to Will himself. Maybe Nico would have done something as absolutely ridiculously reckless as put his own life at risk just to spite Will? Surely not. Surely not –

He called in the help of Austin and Kayla after that. His siblings who, naturally, called upon the ranks of the children of Apollo as a whole. Nico really was their mascot, regardless of the fact that he was older than most of them. They seemed to dote on their resident Death Kid, even surly and scowling as he was almost _all the time_. The camp was quickly flooded with Apollo's kids scampering around and raking the grounds, skirting the tree line and infiltrating every cabin. The other demigods watched in confused amusement, but none stopped to answer their questions.

Will asked Hestia's hearth for assistance, even though she so rarely responded to anyone. He knew that Nico had a strange and sort of special relationship with the goddess, developed from his very first days at camp. Unfortunately, Hestia evidently didn't feel such compassion for other demigods, for she didn't answer. Which left Will racing frantically around the grounds once more, casting Iris-messages into the fountain to call Reyna and Hazel both – with little success; both only offered their worries dissent to his questions – and largely working himself into a fit.

Until he found him. Of course he would find him, just as Will became convinced that Nico had somehow managed to get himself killed and it would be all Will's fault because _he_ had been angry at him and if he hadn't been angry then he wouldn't have run away and –

He wasn't dead. He wasn't even hiding. Not really. Nico had simply been overlooked, and Will only noticed him because, on the third time he ran into Hades' cabin calling for Nico, he'd paused outside the door and turned his gaze imploringly to the sky as he raked his fingers through his hair. Nico's boot was dangling just visibly over the edge of the roof.

Will closed his eyes with a heavy sigh, chin falling forwards onto his chest and propping his hands onto his hips. When he opened his eyes once more, it was to catch sight of Austin outside of Demeter's cabin directly across the grounds to him. Austin slowed in his step as he made towards the next cabin and quirked an eyebrow, his expression confused but rapidly fading into relief and then snorting amusement as Will simply gestured overhead. An instant later Will saw him race over to the nearest Apollo member and gesture towards the Hades' cabin. They both gave long-suffering shakes of their heads as if to say "of course he'd do something like that".

No one ever thought to look up.

"Bloody pain in the arse," Will muttered to himself as he rounded the cabin looking for a place to climb up. He trusted Austin to call off the search and set himself to preparing a scolding rant about the stupidity of sulking emos. Did he even know how worried Will had been? Again? No, of course he didn't. He would never suspect.

Will thought as such with only mild irritation, however, his relief almost overwhelming him. Nico wasn't dead, or apparently lost between planes of existence as he'd collapsed mid shadow travel. Those two facts themselves were the ambrosia of realisations.

Will had to end up jumping to catch onto the lowest awning around the back of the cabin to haul himself onto the roof. How Nico had managed it was a mystery given that he was still shorter than Will was, but he didn't spare much thought for it. Instead, he clambered onto his knees then rose to standing as to make his way across the roof.

It was steeple-shaped, but not difficult to traverse. Will wondered if whoever had first made the cabins had intended the roof to be flat enough around the edges to circumnavigate or if it was just a lucky coincidence. Whatever reason, Will was grateful as he skirted around the edge of the triangular prism at the centre of the roof and made his way towards where Nico lay with one leg still dangling slightly over the edge of the roof with eyes closed, frown affixed and hands pillowed beneath his head.

And headphones on.

Well, at least that explained why he hadn't heard Will as he'd called for him throughout Hades' cabin. It didn't excuse him, but explain it did. The frustrating bastard.

Will strode over to him, resisting the urge to kick him off the edge of the roof, and dropped to a squat at his side. He simply crouched for a moment, looking at his frowning, oblivious boyfriend and deliberately pushing worries of how pale he looked and should he take a look at his hand and how had he gotten so tired as to actually reacquire smudges under his eyes? It was a struggle, but Will withheld from doing so. He was quite proud of his restraint; even in the Apollo cabin he was acknowledged as the primary vitakinetic and had something of a healing people problem. A real problem. He couldn't help it – it was a character flaw. Or a character correctness, depending on whether one asked Will's mother or just about anyone else in the world.

Whether Nico honestly didn't hear his arrival - surely his music wasn't blaring that loudly – or he was simply resolutely ignoring his arrival, Will wasn't sure. After nearly five whole minutes of sitting in silence, however, his impatience got the better of him and Will reached forwards and plucked an ear of his headphones from his head. And yes, apparently his music really had been blaring.

Nico blinked his eyes open, starting slightly before immediately turning his frowning glare upon Will. For once it didn't serve to amuse Will quite as much as it usually did. Nico propped himself up onto his elbows and flipped his headphones around his neck. "What?"

"You'll go deaf if you keep listening to music that loudly, you know," Will commented idly, just for something to say.

Nico's glare narrowed further and he deliberately lowered himself back into his recline once more, turning his gaze upwards. "Maybe I don't want to hear. Some people have some pretty stupid shit to say these days."

Will bit back the urge to wince. It was almost as hard to fight as his urge to frown and argue that if anyone was being stupid it was Nico. But that wouldn't get them anywhere. And besides, he'd come after Nico to… well, maybe not _apologise,_ because Will still maintained that he had very definitely not been in the wrong, but at least attempt to lower the abruptly constructed wall that had been erected between them. He didn't like walls, especially when they stood between the two of them.

Brushing aside the grumbling criticism, Will lowered himself down onto the roof so that he was lying alongside Nico and staring up at the sky. It was a pale blue, that perfect sort of blue that was untouched by clouds and faded into something paler on the horizon. It was warm, too, enough that he didn't need to wear a jacket even if the roof beneath him was a little cold.

Taking a sigh, Will reached down and grasped Nico's hand. His good hand, thankfully, because when Nico tried to tug his fingers free he could grasp tightly enough that it would have been almost painful. He wouldn't let go, probably wouldn't even if it had been his broken fingers. "I was looking for you."

"Were you really?" Nico's words didn't incite continuation of the attempted conversation, but Will ignored the suggestion.

"Really. Because I was worried about you."

"Unnecessarily. You stupid Chicken."

"Did you just call me a –"

"Chicken, yes. Because you're such a bloody mother hen."

Will turned his head to glance at Nico's profile. He'd maintained his fixed frown and, though his eyes where still trained towards the sky, Will was very certain that his glare was meant for him.

Heaving another heavy sigh, Will turned his gaze up towards the sky himself. "I guess I deserve that. Mostly because it's true."

"Of course it's true. Everything I call you is entirely true. _Every. Word_."

Apparently, Nico was still very definitely pissed off. The time Will had spent deflating from his own anger and growing in concern as he searched for him eased none of Nico's. It wasn't fiery and explosive as was Will's, but when Nico was angry he made sure everyone knew.

Every word? Every name he called him? Yes, in that moment, Will could very much believe that Nico considered him a bastard, and a pain in the arse, a dickhead, and, when he was feeling particularly multilingual, a _carogna_. His less scathing insults suddenly seemed like fond memories. Will almost wished Nico would just go back to calling him a Quack.

 _How to make him understand?_ Will pondered the thought in silence as they lay side by side, Nico every now and again making a motion to tug his hand from Will's grasp. Will resolutely tightened his fingers each time, making no other response as though the jerking attempts were barely consequential.

Will didn't believe he was unjustified in his attitude towards Nico's actions. His anger may have been, but that anger was driven by what Will was rapidly realising was sheer terror that something had happened to Nico. He had been _terrified_ , as much for his ignorance as for the possibility that something had happened. Because if something had happened, then Will wouldn't have known about it and couldn't have done anything. He would have been effectively useless.

No demigod could handle being useless. Will had yet to meet one who would be content to sit idle while events were roiling around them. Blame the ADHD or whatever, but that was the truth of the matter. For Will, he couldn't simply sit still when someone was hurting, not when he could fix. If only he could draw Nico inside his head to show him the jumble of thoughts and make him _understand_ what had made him speak as he had.

Quite without his direction, Will's tongue took that thought as a suggestion and sprung into action. Will felt as much an audience to his words as Nico was. He wondered which of them was less inclined to listen.

"You know, for the last two days apparently I've been insufferable. I didn't realise it myself, but then I haven't really realised much of anything since you didn't come back on Sunday night. And then when I Iris-messaged Reyna and she said that you'd gone off on a quest with Hazel and her cohort and were uncontactable?" He swallowed past the tightness in his throat. The memory of his rapid descent into catastrophising was almost as bad as it had been the first time round, before they'd even started dating. The difference was that this time Will could feel Nico's presence at his side and knew for certain that, at least in that moment, he was safe. "I was absolutely terrified. I… I don't think I've been more scared for anything in my life. Not facing monsters or anything. I was just really, really scared that something had happened to you."

There. He'd said it. And when the last of the words escaped his lips, Will felt a rush of light-headedness at blurting them out. They were true, they were what he felt, but even acknowledging that truth he'd expected it to be somehow more embarrassing than it had been. Maybe it would have had anybody else been there to hear it, but when it was just him, his back pressed against the cold roof of cabin thirteen and the sky stretching an unbroken blue overhead, when it was just Nico lying silently next to him with his hand finally stilled in Will's, it had been almost too easy. Heartfelt and easy.

_I should try this whole telling the truth thing more often. Maybe Dad was onto something with being the God of Truth and all that._

Nico was silent. He didn't say anything and he didn't move. In fact, he was silent for so long that, as Will waded through his light-headedness and settled back into reality once more, he had to glance at him to check if he'd even heard him at all. That he hadn't slipped his headphones one without Will's notice and fallen back to ignoring him. Will wouldn't put it past him to have done so; Nico wasn't a mean person, no matter how much he tried to convince both himself and those around him, but he was unerringly stubborn. Stubborn to his own detriment at times, and mulishly resistant to explanation and rationalisation.

He wasn't listening to his music. He wasn't even pretending to ignore Will, which may have been anticipated. There was still a frown on his forehead but his gaze was settled upon Will's face and, though there was still disgruntlement thickly shadowing his eyes there was thoughtfulness there too. As though he actually had heard – really heard – what Will had said.

But then, "You're so stupidly confusing."

Will couldn't suppress the snort that erupted from him. Nico's response was so opposite to what he had expected that he wasn't sure whether to be offended or amused. "What do you mean confusing?"

Nico stared at him for a moment longer, blinking slowly. Then he shook his head and turned back towards the sky. He made a grumble that could have been a string of Italian imprecations just as easily as it could have been another expression of confusion. His scowl was more of a simple pursing of his lips, his glare more of a slight crease in his brow. "You said you were scared. Because you didn't know where I was. Because you were worried I'd get myself into trouble. Right?"

"Right." That much seemed like he understood. What about that was confusing?

"But why?"

"What do you mean why?"

"Why would you worry about that?"

Will stared at Nico for a moment. Surely he was pulling his leg. He couldn't actually, genuinely be asking _why Will cared_. Nico wasn't stupid, regardless of how often Will might accuse him of being so. Nor was he that oblivious – most of the time. Speaking slowly, ensuring that Nico heard the thickness of his condescension, Will said, "Well, you're my boyfriend, and believe it or not I do actually like having you around. Going off and getting yourself killed would be a bit annoying. I'd have to put all that work into finding a new one."

The derision in Nico's glance was actually welcomed. It was a relief to see something other than that hard anger and coldness. "Don't talk down to me. I know _that."_

"Do you really? Good for you."

"Shut up, Will."

Will actually had to struggle to keep from smiling at that. It was almost normal and – what kind of person was Will that he actually _liked_ being told to shut up? There was definitely something wrong with him. But even so, it was a relief to fall back into something that resembled their norm, even if Will did still ache from the aftermath of his worry and the last lingering sparks of anger.

"Much and all as you can be _insufferable_ at times, I do understand that," Nico continued. "Clearly, otherwise I wouldn't be your boyfriend."

"Clearly."

"Shut up," Nico repeated. He didn't even bother to glance at Will this time. "What I meant was _why_ do you worry so much. I'm more than capable of looking after myself. You know I'm good with a sword and even if that fails me I can always shadow travel away if I really need to." He shook his head and even though Will couldn't quite see it for himself he knew he was rolling his eyes. "You're a massive worry-wart and it's so unnecessary. You work yourself up into a fit –"

"I don't 'work myself into a –'"

"Will, you literally just did. Not even an hour ago. Or have you forgotten that already." Nico shook his head, still not looking at Will. "Do you have any idea have infuriating it is that you get so worked up about nothing? There's no _reason_ to worry."

Will stared at Nico so fiercely that he was surprised that he didn't burst into flames. Then, with deliberate slowness, he let go of Nico hand, reached across his chest and grasped his other, bandaged hand. Holding it aloft, he glanced between Nico's raised hand and his face pointedly. "Really? I have nothing to worry about?"

"That's hardly anything. It's not –"

"You broke your fingers, Nico. On your sword hand. That makes it something."

"You're exaggerating because you're being a bloody Chicken –"

"I'm not exaggerating." Will shook Nico's hand for emphasis, ignoring the elbow in the ribs Nico gave him in dispute. "Honestly, how hard is it for you to understand that I might worry about you? And no, I don't mean that you 'understand', I mean _really_ understand. Has it been so long since anyone has been actually concerned about you, even when you're not in direct danger, that you don't recognise what it looks like?"

Nico finally turned to Will at that, staring at him with a frown that was part frustrated and part sceptical. And Will got his answer.

Oh.

It really had.

Will was silenced by the revelation. Slowly, he curled his fingers gently around Nico's and, though he knew it really shouldn't, the very last of his anger dissipated completely. _This_ was where the confusion lay. Nico apparently knew that Will would worry about him when he was endangered, but couldn't quite fathom that anyone would care enough to be concerned even when he wasn't. Perhaps he didn't think that anyone thought about him enough to even contemplate what he was doing when he wasn't directly before them. The thought was just a little heartbreaking. Will actually felt his throat close up slightly.

Squeezing softly at Nico's fingers, he sent a pulse of his rudimentary healing skills into the injuries beneath, a musical hum of enhancement arising naturally alongside it. No more than a hum – it wasn't really serious enough for a full song of healing, even if it concerned Will nonetheless. He could feel them, the hairline fractures on his two end fingers, the bruising upon the hand as a whole. Will could feel the pain as well as the injury, and just as he did he knew that Nico was deliberately ignoring it. Like he did with just about everything he didn't want to consider. Apparently he could somehow switch off pain, too, silencing it with a well-aimed glare.

"You know," Will murmured, keeping his hand on Nico's healed fingers as he gently began to unwind them of bandages. "I actually think about you a lot."

Nico was silent for a moment, and a glance towards him saw that – still frowning – his gaze was affixed upon his hand as Will relieved it of its bindings. "What are you going on about?"

"Just because you aren't here doesn't mean that you don't exist anymore. It doesn't mean that I'm not wondering where you are or what you're doing or whether you're okay. I know – and I'm sure you do too – that you have people that care about you: Hazel, Reyna, Jason and Piper and Percy and Annabeth. Leo too, even if he spends so much time in Bunker Nine that he hardly knows anything that goes on in the world. But…" He glanced up at Nico and could see the closed guardedness of his expression. He didn't need to say it, which was a blessing, as it would have been painful to even voice the truth.

 _But to them, you're not_ the _most important person._

Will wondered if Nico ever had been to anyone. Had his mother cherished him above anyone else? Him and his sister? Had Bianca cared for her younger brother with her whole heart, worried about him in his absence and conjured every possible catastrophe that could confront him when he wasn't by her side? Will wasn't sure, but he hoped so. He hoped that, even if just in his childhood, Nico had been the most important person to those he too cherished the most. Will didn't need to have seen all that much of their interactions – what he had was minimal at best – to know that Nico had all but hero-worshipped Bianca. In a sibling kind of way, but the truth was apparent enough. And Bianca had seemed to feel much of the same way.

But when she was gone…

"You worry about me, don't you?" Will found himself saying. "You said before, when I went off with Lester looking for his lyre. It was expected to be a relatively easy quest, and it was only by chance that we saw any monsters at all. But even knowing that, you worried, right?" Worried a lot, apparently, if the simple fact that he had mentioned it was any indication. Nico rarely voiced anything that even resembled concern.

Nico had turned towards him, and that same resistance to voicing such welled within his expression once more. He seemed to struggle with his natural inclination to remain mute before he slowly nodded. He seemed disgruntled to have had to admit it but at least the anger had faded to barely visible now.

"I'm the same as that," Will finished, wrapping Nico's hand between both of his. It was awkward, given that they were both lying half on their backs, but he managed and felt contented for the simple contact. Even better when Nico didn't immediately attempt to draw his hand from Will's grasp.

"It's not the same," Nico murmured.

"What?"

"I said it's not the same."

 _And here comes the resistance all over again,_ Will thought with an inward sigh. "How is it different?"

"Because you're incompetent in a fight, that's why. I'm just as worried you'll stab yourself with your own sword when you're just returning it to the armoury, let alone fighting with it."

It was a massive exaggeration, Will knew. Just as he knew that Nico was exaggerating because he truly was worried. Will was far from being a poor swordsman, was even one of the better of the children of Apollo and not only because he was a little on the older end of spectrum. It was only next to Nico that he looked vaguely incapable, but then Nico was something of a machine when he fought, a whirlwind of black sword and shadows. All that zombie practice fighting had paid off.

Will didn't really care, though. Nico had admitted for the second time that day that he felt worried for Will. Even better, it appeared to be in the same way that Will worried for him. It felt as though he'd been given a gift for those simple, backhanded words.

"Then you understand?" Will asked. "You understand why I'm worried? Maybe?"

Nico's frown deepened as he glanced up at the sky once more and re-pursed his lips. Why he was actively fighting that understanding Will didn't know, but he didn't push him towards it, regardless of how much he wanted to. "Because you're a hypochondriac?"

"No," Will sighed. "Or at least, not only that. You don't seem to understand –"

"No, _you_ don't understand, Will." Finally, Nico turned his full attention towards Will. He actually rolled fully in his recline so that he could meet his eyes more easily. You don't even understand what pisses me off so much."

"So then tell me," Will prompted. He clutched at Nico's hand until he heard a knuckle pop when Nico tried to jerk it away in withdrawal.

With another grumble, Nico heaved a sigh that managed to blow his fringe. Then he was glaring again and his anger had returned. "You're telling me what I'm supposed to do like you're not _allowing_ me to do it. You're telling me not to shadow travel, or to go on a quest with Hazel, or to go to New Rome –"

"I never told you not to go to New Rome," Will interrupted, and was momentarily relieved that he had held his tongue from doing so on previous instances.

"Shut up, Will. Don't interrupt me when I'm telling you off."

Will bit back the urge to laugh. Damn him and his tendency to swell with amusement before Nico's disgruntlement. He bit his lip to withhold it. "You're right. Sorry. Go on."

Nico only glared harder for a moment as though he'd heard Will's thoughts spoken aloud. "The point is that you're telling me not to do what I _want_ to do and it's infuriating! That's not worrying, Will. That's tyranny."

And finally, understanding dawned. Will felt it rise like the sun and couldn't hold back his spreading smile this time. Blessedly it was small, for even that slight slip curled Nico's lip angrily. "I think I understand now."

"Do you really?"

"Yes. You've got a problem with authority."

Nico's glare abruptly dropped into blank-faced confusion. He blinked. "What?"

Will nodded. "Yeah, that makes sense, actually. You've never really had anyone tell you what to do. Other than you're Mum, I guess, but not after that. And how old were you when you had to leave your Mum? Eight or something, wasn't it?"

Nico's rapid blinking seemed to struggle for a moment, wavering as he attempted to reassert his glare. "You're belittling me, aren't you?"

"You have a problem with that, too. Have I never told you?"

"Shut your face, Solace."

"That might be a little difficult."

"Gods, you're so annoying."

"I try." Will smiled. He smiled widely and happily, because the puzzle pieces were fitting into place a little more readily now. And even though Nico still appeared to be wavering between wanting to kick Will away from him or bury him in the weight of his glares, Will knew what to do. It might not fix everything entirely but it might help. Maybe.

Releasing Nico's hand, Will slid across the slight distance between them until he could easily slip his arms around him enough to lock his hands around Nico's shoulders. Which, like an indignant cat, Nico was _definitely_ not happy with. He wriggled for a moment, strained and hissed, but Will simply held onto him and squeezed him more firmly.

"Will, what the hell? I'm pissed off at you, so you need to –"

"I'm sorry," Will said before Nico could get himself too worked up into a tiff. "I'm sorry for what I said. It came out wrong."

Nico froze in his arms. "What?"

"I'm sorry I got angry at you, and that I sounded like I was trying to tell you what to do." Will wasn't sure if that was how it had really sounded, but it was what Nico had heard and that was all that mattered. "I'm sorry that you seem to see the fact that I worry about you, and that I want to know you're okay and where you are just in case, seems like I'm being tyrannical. That's not what I intended.

"Honestly, Nico, I don't like you shadow travelling because I'm scared that one time you do it when you're just a little bit too tired you'll trip and fall into the shadows in between them and I'll lose you. I don't like it when you go off on quests with Hazel without telling me – or with anyone without telling me – because it means that I can't be there to have your back, or to patch you up if you get hurt. And I don't like you going to Camp Jupiter every second weekend not because I want to keep you on a leash but because I just want to be with you."

There. That was it. That was all of it, as honestly as Will could attempt to explain it. He didn't know if it would get through to Nico but it was the best he could attempt. Overlooking the tension that still tightened Nico's frame, he held onto his boyfriend and just let himself sit with the knowledge that he might have screwed up a little bit, justified that he _still_ felt his anger had been, but that at the end of it all he was simply relieved that Nico was alright.

His stupid boyfriend with his skewed view of genuine concern. What was he to do with him?

Surprisingly, Nico actually begun to relax in Will's embrace. Slowly, so slowly that at first Will didn't even notice. Then he did abruptly, and it was like a balloon deflating of its puffed up fury. Nico didn't speak for a moment, hardly even moved, until finally, in a voice that was barely loud enough to be heard, he murmured, "Oh."

"Get it?"

Nico hummed something that could have been agreement or the exact opposite. Then he fell silent again and they simply lay in silence. A comfortable silence, however, for Will had shaken himself loose of the last of his fear, his anger and his worry, and felt calm. And Nico… he wasn't sure, but Will thought that Nico might have done so too. At least a little bit.

"You know," Nico muttered. "If you want to come to Camp Jupiter with me you can."

Will started at the unexpectedness of Nico's words and glanced down at his face. "What?"

"You don't have to if you don't want to," Nico hastened to add. He kept his chin tucked as though reluctant. Or bashful. _A bashful Nico. Who'd have guessed?_ "I just didn't think you wanted to come."

"Why? Why would I _ever_ not want to come with you?"

"Because it's shadow travelling the whole way there and you don't like shadow travelling –"

"I don't like it because I'm worried about _you,_ you stupid Death Kid," Will said, but there was no anger and barely even reprimand in his tone. He felt his smile grow as Nico flashed him a reprimanding glance at the use of the nickname. "If I could come with you to make sure you were alright when you did it, then," he shrugged, and his smile widened. "You really mean it?"

Nico pursed his lips slightly once more, then shrugged himself. "Believe it or not, I do actually like your company."

"Really? I had begun to wonder."

Nico jabbed him in the belly with a sharp uppercut that temporarily rendered Will painfully breathless. "Yes, really. Even if you are an idiot. And even if you do sound like a Soprano singer when you get angry."

Will had been smiling. He was happy and smiling until Nico said that. Then his smile slipped, unhinged. "Excuse me?"

Nico peered up at him with just the barest hint of a teasing smile. Will hardly had the chance to appreciate it, to appreciate the progression from his cold anger of minutes before, for his confusion at Nico's words. "Yeah. When you're upset, you have a sort of high-pitched voice."

"I do not."

"Yeah, you do. You and your Soprano tendencies."

"Soprano," Will spluttered, torn between indignation and bemusement. "That's exaggerating just a little bit, don't you think?

Nico shrugged and his smile grew slightly wider. "Not really. At least I don't think so. Soprano."

"Hey, don't call me that. It's –"

"Incredibly accurate. No, I think it suits you quite well, actually. Soprano." Nico hummed as though savouring the word on his tongue.

Will couldn't help but snort in amusement. He wasn't even terribly embarrassed for the teasing – teasing that had to be an exaggeration. Surely. He rolled his eyes and drew Nico into a tighter hold that drew a mew of disgruntlement but surprisingly little else. He hardly struggled to untangle himself for more than a few seconds.

It was a relief to come out on the other side of their fight. A fight that, though short-lived, had been explosive and nearly as damaging as such a real explosion. It could have ended terribly, with Will most likely in tears and Nico vanished somewhere through his shadows and potentially lost because he was too tired and angry and –

It hadn't. Will quashed the temporary revival of worry, of terror, and wrapped himself more tightly around Nico. They were comfortable, and together, and after their unexpected discussion – of which Will at least had found enlightening – he felt that they had come out grown. Changed. Somehow more. And if the lack of Nico's withdrawal from their casually intimate embrace was any indication, he wasn't the only one who thought so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hi everyone! Hope you liked the chapter - fluff, Gods, I can't help myself! If you did, or if you had anything else to say, please leave a comment. Every word counts a billion times over.


	4. First Flues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: The time Nico discovered that Will was a massive hypochondriac, but never for himself, and Nico gets to rub his face in it.

Will was a worrier. That was what Nico had discovered and was something that he'd suspected even before their first big fight. Or at least what Will called their first big fight, because Nico maintained that it was mostly just Will being an idiot.

Which he was. Pretty much always. His worrying was only another example of that idiocy. How everyone at camp didn't realise just how much of a mother hen Will was Nico didn't know. It was bloody obvious to him.

That worrying aspect of Will's personality manifested itself through his healing. Nico had seen it time and time again at the end of each of their camp games when someone inevitably needed patching up, or when he doled out cold and flu meds to the puffy-eyed and sniffling demigods that hadn't thought to buy any for themselves. He had an bottomless well of patience for sick people, patience that wasn't exactly mirrored in every other aspect of his life, and at times Nico had to wonder at how healthy that concern was. Was it possibly to be too caring about other people's wellbeing?

Yes. Yes, it definitely was.

Will's worry-reflex was definitely put to the test in what was retrospectively called 'the epidemic'. It wasn't really an epidemic – Nico knew what an epidemic was and the sickness that spread throughout the camp definitely wasn't one. No one even died. It was positively tame in terms of outbreaks.

The first people that came down with it fell ill with the change of seasons. At first it had seemed like simple hay fever, sniffily noses, sore throats and mild temperatures. Still, mild as they were, Will's mother hen-ing reared its head and he gathered the self-pitying souls beneath him and drew them into the infirmary of the Big House. Nico could only roll his eyes and shake his head as he followed his clucking boyfriend.

Children of Apollo were naturally gifted at healing. With that gift came the inclination to heal, Nico always considered, and that inclination was demonstrated when Will drew the quartet of snuffling, sneezing and coughing demigods into the bright rooms and between cloud-like curtains that draped around each bed. Nico paused in the doorway as Will systematically sat each down upon a bed with the order to lie down, and proceeded to head towards the medicine cabinet that resembled more of a library of pill bottles, medication refrigerators and draws of scissors, syringes, cotton buds and bandages. Before he'd made it halfway there at least three other children of Apollo skirted pat Nico and hastened towards him, offers to help spilling from their lips.

Nico wandered idly into the room and stopped at the side of Kevin Lee's bed. The son of Hypnos was already reclined upon the bed, eyes drifting towards sleep beneath the fuzzy flop of fringe that entirely concealed his eyebrows. Nico flicked his foot – he still had his shoes on. Why in Hades wouldn't he take his shoes off before falling to sleep? – and Xavier started slightly. Slowly, if a startled flinch could possible be slow.

"Whazzup?"

"Don't fall to sleep yet," Nico said, folding his arms and catching the eye of Ai Miyagi in the next bed. "You've got to get dosed up first."

"Right, right," Kevin nodded. He scrubbed a hand across his reddened nose and sniffed wetly. Nico grimaced in distaste; he had no qualms about admitting that he was disinclined towards doctoring. Ever. "Sorry, I'm just so tired."

"You Hypnos kids are always tired. What's new?"

"Yeah, but I'm sick, so I feel even more tired."

"I think he feels he's justified in his tiredness now, rather than just being lazy," Ai commented from the next bed over. She paused, holding up a finger for a second before sneezing in a series of mouse-like squeaks. Her dark eyes were watery and even more puffy and red than Kevin's were. "Not that Hypnos kids ever feel the need to justify their sleeping habits."

"What's wrong with you?" Nico asked as Ai plucked a tissue from the nightstand. "Is it just hayfever or are you really sick? I have my suspicions that Clovis is just using it as an excuse to while away the day in bed." He shot a glance towards the Hypnos counsellor two beds down, who only glanced at him and raised a hand to wave in acknowledgement.

Ai shook her head so that her long dark hair did that weird fluffing thing that everyone seemed to complimented her for and scrubbed at her nose with a tissue. "Nope. I don't get hayfever. And to be honest, I feel too much like shit to think it's just an immunological overreaction." She sniffed once more and reattempted to blow her nose. "And yeah, maybe you're right. It's statistically unlikely that half of us would be from Hypnos' cabin out of the entire pickings of the camps demigods. But then, I guess if you've got a couple of people sick than sleeping in close proximity would spread it faster. So maybe they're not actually pulling a fast one."

Nico nodded, even if he didn't fully keep up with some of what the daughter of Athena had said. The speed and lecturing tone of her voice, even heavy with sickness, reminded him of when Will went off on a tangent riddled with medical terms. Although Nico had to admit that in this instance it wasn't overtly complex. "Spreading germs, right?"

"You got it."

"Okay. Stay away from me, then."

Ai gave a wan smile. "So compassionate of you, Nico."

"I never claimed to be."

"Just living up to the expectations of your character, then, huh?"

"Well, I wouldn't want to disappoint anyone."

Ai snorted, which set her off into another round of mouse-sneezes and, grimacing once more, Nico withdrew from the sickbeds to the other side of the room. He hadn't been lying – Nico couldn't remember the last time he'd been and didn't intend to contract anything any time soon.

Will and his platoon of doctors descended upon their patients moments later. Dishing out medication, cough lollies, nasal sprays – which completely disconcerted Nico to watch being administered – and some thick, sharp smelling balm that was rubbed on backs and collar bones and made the snifflers sigh with evident relief.

Will stepped back to Nico's side when he'd finished, rubbing hand sanitiser into his fingers as he did so and frowning slightly. Nico watched him as he watched his patients until that watching just became too ridiculously extensive. "For Gods' sake, Will, they've just got head colds."

Twisting his lips slightly, Will shook his head. More to himself than to Nico, though. "No, I think it might be something besides that."

"What, your doctor senses are tingling or something, are they?"

"You don't have to make fun of that every time I suggest it, you know. And I _know_ you actually understand that it's a real thing." Will turned a long-suffering glance towards Nico.

Nico only shrugged. He did know, yes, but that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy himself with teasing Will about it. "I'm still sceptical."

"You're always sceptical."

"Of course I am. It makes for less disappointment when reality is proved wrong."

"That's very pessimistic of you."

"No. It's very _realistic_ of me."

"Pessimist."

"Realist."

Will shook his head in exasperation, but Nico was satisfied to see a small smile playing upon his lips. It was always a relief to see Will smile. Nico had in the past found it annoying – and still did sometimes – but after he'd seen him grow so angry after that weekend that he'd helped out Hazel and Frank… Nico hadn't realised that someone else's emotions could so strongly affect him until that moment.

Like the fact that, though Nico hardly cared to become involved in the doctoring care that Will was administering, his evident concern and focus wore off on Nico and he found himself joining Will in the infirmary or the Apollo cabin for reasons entirely different to what they usually were. He wasn't the only one. Like a physical need, at least half a dozen of the children of Apollo were dancing and darting around their infirmary in an attempt to be useful, to heal their ailing peers through emotional support as much as dishing out medication. Nico didn't do so well with the emotional stuff, but he could hand out pills easily enough.

It was because of this assistance that he found himself working in the infirmary alongside Will. It was also how, barely three days later, Nico found himself kicked _out_ of said infirmary. Naturally, it was Will's neurotic worrying that made it happen.

The number of sickly demigods had more than doubled in number over the past few days, and was only growing as more developed the tell-tale signs of puffy eyes, grogginess and explosive sneezing. Half of Hypnos' cabin escaped combat practice with the excuse that they were 'sick', and despite Will and his half-siblings verifying that they were indeed unwell, Nico had Ai's words and his natural scepticism niggling a the back of his thoughts the whole time. Funny, that though unwell, they seemed perfectly happy to simply remain in their own beds rather than moving to the infirmary. Everyone knew that Hypnos' cabin had the most comfortable beds in camp. Probably because they spent so much time in them.

Ai herself had developed a horrendous cough that was at odds with the delicacy of her sneezes. She sounded like a barking dog for the hoarseness of the sound, and it evidently hadn't taken Will all that long to figure out what was wrong with her. He frowned as he stood over her bed.

After administering the appropriate medication – Nico didn't know what it was and didn't have the desire to learn the complicated and excessively long names of the drugs – he drew across the room to where Nico had taken up residence leaning against the back of one of the infirmary's arm chairs. He sighed heavily.

"That sounds depressing," Nico commented.

"Sorry," Will muttered, evidently oblivious to Nico's sarcasm. It was a testament to how thoroughly he was considering – or brooding over – the situation that he overlooked it, had the concerned frown upon his forehead not been telling enough. Will was usually pretty sharp with that sort of thing. "I just always feel really useless in these sort of situations."

"Useless?" Nico nudged him with an accusing foot. "How exactly do you figure you're being useless? No one else can diagnose and medicate as well as you can, let alone actually heal. Well, maybe some of the rest of Apollo's kids could do nearly as well, but…"

"It's not that. I mean, I always have more difficulty handling illnesses and stuff than injuries. Injuries are at least easier to fix."

"So you'd rather someone be in pain over a broken leg then struggling with the snuffles of a head cold?" Nico said sarcastically.

"Yeah, pretty much," Will said, overlooking Nico's sarcasm once more as his frown turned towards Ai. "At least with a break or something I can usually heal it just with my gift from Dad rather than having to use ambrosia or nectar or even having to strap it or something."

"Gods forbid you'd have to resort to strapping."

Will actually heard Nico's teasing that time. He cast him a small smile before turning back to look at Ai as she bent double beneath another coughing fit. Wesley stepped up to her side and rubbed her back supportively. His frown resettled and he gestured towards Ai. "Like this, for instance. I know what's wrong with her now, but sicknesses are a lot harder to just _fix_ than something like a broken fingers or a bruise is. It's wispy and hard to grasp, and even if I do manage to grab it and shake it loose there's usually a little bit of the disease that gets left behind."

Pausing for a moment to consider Will's description of his healing – it always baffled Nico as much as it did fascinate him; hearing of anyone else's godly gifts generally invoked similar reactions, and not just from Nico – he shook his head. "What's she got, then?"

"Ai? Whooping cough, as far as I can work out. Her immune systems pretty shot, though, so she's riddled with a whole heap of secondary illnesses too."

"Whooping cough? That's why she's making that barking sound?"

Will actually shot him another small smile at that. "Barking sound?"

"She sounds like a dog."

Will snorted. "Fair enough. I guess that's a pretty accurate description of it."

"Can you fix it? Not with your Apollo magic-fingers or whatever –"

"Magic fingers?"

"- but can't you give her some medicine or something? Or what about those shots things? They usually fix people up, don't they?"

"'Shots things'," Will quoted with a smirk and a shake of his head. Though Nico knew he was being condescending he didn't mind so much. At least he was showing another emotion besides concern. "No, shots don't work _after_ you've contracted the disease. That would be basically redundant."

"Why?"

Nico regretted asking as soon as he'd spoken when Will adopted his faintly lecturing tone. "Because a shot – a vaccination – is injecting a portion of a disease into the body – it could be just a part of the disease, destroyed cells, cells without their nucleus; something like that – so that the body recognises the, ah… fingerprint of sorts that the disease has. Like a personalised pattern. That recognition's stored in the immune system as memory cells, which are basically the leftover cells that have fought the invasion of foreign cells and whose job is basically just to exist and remember the fingerprint of the disease. They just sit around and wait for the potential infection of that disease as it _really_ is, not just the less dangerous version of it, so that the body can react and fight the disease before it can get a solid foothold." He paused, glancing towards Nico with a slightly quirked eyebrow. "Get it?"

Nico blinked at Will blankly for a moment. He wouldn't admit that most of Will's words had just gone in one ear and out the other. Instead, he responded to the only part that had really made all that much sense. "Sucks to be a memory cell. Poor bastards, just sitting around and waiting for their chance to shine."

Will gave a brief chuckle. "Yeah, I can't imagine you'd make a very good memory cell. You're too impatient."

"I resent that."

"Doesn't make it any less true."

"I still resent it."

They fell into silence for a moment, watching Wesley talk quietly to Ai and her croaking replies, Kayla as she chatted to Austin across a bed as they made it together – Miranda Gardiner, the fourth of the initial quartet to have arrived, had checked herself out of the infirmary that morning – and Sammy as she strummed as her lute in an attempt to add some uplifting spirit to the room of the sickly. It was a good thing she was a decent player, because she'd been going for hours.

"Obviously the shots don't work, then," Nico finally said.

"How do you mean?"

Nico gestured towards Ai. "She still got sick."

Will quirked his lips then shrugged. "Yeah, sometimes it might still happen if you're a little ill-equipped to handle a pathological invasion at the time. Worn down, already sick, all that. Or maybe she just hasn't been vaccinated."

"Isn't that sort of thing obligatory these days?"

"Yeah, pretty much. Although some idiot parents think it's a bad idea and it's actually detrimental to their kid's health." He grumbled something derogatory beneath his breath. Then he glanced towards Nico. "It wasn't when you were a kid?"

Nico shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it was. Not in my town, though."

Will stared at him for a moment blankly, slowly blinking. "Then… you're not immunised."

"Against what?"

"Against _anything_. You're entirely defenceless."

"Well, that's a little harsh. Didn't you say you develop immunity when you're exposed to it or something?"

"Yeah, but you haven't – you don't – you can't have –" Will stuttered and his blank expression became wide-eyed and faintly horrified. Then, before Nico even had the chance to grow defensive, Will grabbed him by the arm and practically flew from the infirmary.

Nico nearly tumbled down the stairs as he was dragged after him. "Will, what the hell?"

Will drew to a stop, spun Nico around and planted him a good distance away from the Big House with his hands on Nico's shoulders. "You. Stay here. Or, well, no, you don't have to stay here, just don't come back into the infirmary."

Nico frowned. "Are you telling me what to do? Because I thought we talked about this -"

"In this instance, Nico, I don't give a shit if it pisses you off. You're not coming into my infirmary again until everyone's better."

" _Your_ infirmary?"

Will nodded curtly. "Yes. Mine. I don't want you contracting every known disease under the sun because you weren't properly immunised as a kid. First chance I get, we're going to go see my mum and you're going to get so many shots you won't be able to lift your arms for a week."

Nico deliberately folded his arms across his chest and scowled. "I highly doubt you have every known disease in your little backyard infirmary there."

"Don't fight me on this one, Nico. I'm not going to cave." Will made a gesture with his hand as though shooing him away. "Now go away," he said, confirming Nico's suspicions to the nature of the gesture. "And steer clear of anyone who even looks like they have a cold."

"It's nearly winter, Will. Just about everyone has a cold."

"Then stay away from everyone!" Without another word, Will turned on his heel and strode back into the Big House. The door slammed shut behind him.

Nico was peeved. Pissed off, really, as much because Will had attempted to tell him what to do as because he'd been effectively abandoned. And yet, unexpectedly, he didn't feel himself growing actually angry. Not this time, anyway. Because despite Will's dictatorial ordering, Nico had been able to hear the worry in his tone. A deep, deep worry, and it didn't taken much of a leap for Nico to work out where that worry had sprung from.

He was concerned about Nico's health, not that he was sick but because he _might_ get sick. It was the same sort of situation that Will had described not all that long ago when he'd flipped a switch over Nico helping Hazel on her quest, something that Nico did feel just a little bit guilty about now, if only because it had so obviously upset Will. This was the same sort of thing: Will wasn't so much concerned for Nico's wellbeing _now_ as he was for what could happen to it in the _future_.

It was a strangely surreal understanding, one that smothered any rising anger or bouts of exceptional disgruntlement that he might find himself experiencing. Nico wasn't used to people caring for him so much; he'd never really considered that he needed anyone to, not after Bianca. Not after his mother, whose memory was so long past and hazy that she was barely a half-remembered face. But Will worried incessantly about everything, and thought too much, and more than just worrying about _everything_ he seemed to worry about Nico. He worried about Nico a lot.

Shaking his head, Nico turned away from the Big House. Just this once he would abide by Will's request. Or more correctly his order, because driven by concern though it was, Nico recognised it for what it was. He'd let it slide this time, and he'd do what he was told. Just this once. To make Will happy.

* * *

Nico's resolution was sorely tested over the next three days. Leaning against the fountain in the middle of camp, he drew his attention back from glaring at the Big House and the infirmary buried within to the console in his hand. Only for a second, however, because for once the game couldn't hold his attention. He was too frustrated, even to shoot the brains out of the digital undead.

He turned his gaze upon the bubbling fountain instead. Someone had been throwing golden _drachma_ into it as though it was a wishing well, which was pretty useless all things considered because Nico knew for a fact that most demigods used the fountain for Iris-messaging and the coins wouldn't last long before the plucking hands of a caller a bit stripped for cash.

He was idly flicking at his console once more, not even looking at the screen, when Leo found him. Leo and Jason, actually, though Nico hadn't known that Jason was even visiting Camp Half-Blood; he and Piper had effectively graduated of a sort and only came to visit about as often as Percy and Annabeth did these days. The pair of chatting voices drew his attention and he raised his eyebrows as Jason lifted a hand in greeting.

The two boys were the best of friends. That much was apparent to anyone who had a pair of eyes. Nico could still remember the blubbering mess that Jason had been the first time he'd visited after Leo's return – not in front of everyone, of course, and he vehemently denied that he had been so momentarily unhinged. It was apparent from the casual way that Jason propped an arm on Leo's shoulder, similar but not quite the same to how Nico always found Will doing with him, and the way that Leo flashed a smile up at his taller friend.

Taller, yes, but then Leo had actually grown a bit in the past months too. Since his return, and since the debacle around Apollo's temporary humanisation and to near-disastrous mess that had followed, Leo appeared to have been putting all of his efforts into growing another foot in height. Naturally, Jason couldn't allow him to have an inch on him, and somehow stretched to match. Nico wasn't entirely without his own growth, but it was nothing compared to the inhuman bursts of height of the other two boys. It was in-demigod, even.

"Hey, Nico, how's it going?" Jason asked, dropping down to sit on the edge of the fountain with a friendly smile.

Nico shrugged, despite wanting to spit and grumble that it was going very frustratingly indeed. He flicked his console off and shoved it into his pocket. "Same old. How about you? When did you get here?"

"This morning," Leo said, taking a seat beside Jason on the fountain and extending his legs before him. Despite his height, he was still elfishly thin and with more protruding bony joints than a skeleton. "Him and Piper just flew in and she's just taken a swing by Aphrodite's cabin to patch up any disasters that Veronique hasn't been able to hand. We were up in the bunker and I was showing him some of my latest inventions."

"Oh, so that's where the smell of burnt toast's coming from."

Jason turned an accusing glare towards Leo. "See? I told you I still stunk from that Poppy-thing!"

"Poppilector," Leo corrected. "And you don't stink. Nico just knows that I've been having trouble with my Poppilector so he's being a pain. You should hear him; he pretty much comments something on it every time I'm down at camp."

"Which isn't all that often, or so I've heard," Jason said, raising his eyebrows as though reprimanding the currently standing Hephaestus cabin counsellor for his laxness.

"In my defence, you do smell kind of crispy most of the time."

"True, but truthful or not, it's unappreciated, Nico." Leo shot Nico a frowning glare that held absolutely no heat to it at all. Honestly, did Leo actually think it was intimidating in the slightest?

"I'm just trying to alert you to your own stupidity," Nico said. "What the possible motivation for improving the perfectly good toaster is –"

"There's just so much else I could do to it! Imagine, self-buttering toasters, being able to toast bread _after_ you've made a sandwich –"

"I'm pretty sure you've just described a sandwich grill," Jason pointed out.

"Thank you, Jason. My point exactly." Nico turned towards Leo and raised his eyebrows. "If you're not going to listen to _me_ then listen to _him_."

"Him has a name, you know."

"Irrelevant, Fly-Boy."

Leo snorted, nodding his appreciation for Nico's disregard of their friend's indignation. Leo was like that; he could switch from affront and discontent to friendly banter and camaraderie in an instant. "But disregarding my inventing successes –"

"Failures, you mean?"

"Moving on!" Leo overrode Nico's words. "What are you up to, Nico? Will still quarantining the infirmary?"

"What's this?" Jason asked, glancing between the two of them.

Nico sighed. "Will's being an overprotective idiot. Again."

"I can hear the affection in your words, Nico. It's buried deeply, but it's there."

Nico only spared Leo an unimpressed glance before turning his attention back to Jason. "You've heard about the apparent epidemic going around?"

Jason shrugged. "Heard about it, yeah. Leo told me when I got here this morning and warned me not to drink the water, which is absolutely ridiculous – you know we don't even get the water from around camp, Leo. It doesn't really seem like an epidemic exactly, though. Is it?"

"Of course not. It's just some people with a cold."

"And three others with Whooping Cough," Leo added. He winced in sympathy. "Poor sods. See, this is why I spend so much time up in the Bunker. The air's less contaminated up there."

"Well done, Leo. I can really feel compassion for the welfare of your fellow demigods from all the way over here."

"Compassion? That's a sort of hypocritical word coming from you, isn't it, Nico?"

Jason chuckled as he glanced between the two of them and Nico deliberately turned his attention back towards him and him only. Leo was friendly enough, but he was a bit of an idiot sometimes – even worse than Will could be – and Nico couldn't help but grow exasperated in his very presence. He'd brought a fiery light to Hephaestus' cabin in the months since his return and Nico was more than happy for him to keep that light away from him and his shadows.

"I've been effectively locked out of the infirmary."

"Just you?" Jason asked with a small smile.

"Just me. Will nearly popped a vein when he found out I wasn't vaccinated."

"You're not vaccinated?" Jason blinked before a frown of concern tightened his brow. "You should get that seen to, Nico. You could get seriously sick."

Ignoring Leo's smirk, Nico rolled his eyes. "Fantastic. Now I have _two_ mother hen's clucking over me. You do realise I don't get sick. I mean, _ever._ I can't even remember the last time I was."

"You've just been lucky," Leo said, sliding down from his seat on the fountain so that he was leaning propped against the marble edge. "You wait, next time you get a cold or something –"

"Piper calls it 'man-flu' when I get a cold," Jason muttered a little dejectedly.

"- then you won't be so keen to throw yourself into the cesspool of disease ridden invalids."

"Is that your affectionate name for them, Leo?"

Leo grinned at Jason's raised eyebrow. "Only always."

Nico turned and leaned against the fountain himself, just as Jason slid himself to the ground to sit between he and Leo. Nico frowned and crossed his arms. "I'm not lucky."

"I'd say you're pretty lucky to never get sick," Jason said.

"No, I mean it's not luck. I just don't get sick. Hazel doesn't either. We've actually talked about it – think it might have something to do with being a child of Hades or something and, I don't know, too touched by death or something. Maybe viruses just don't like me."

There was silence for a moment as Nico glanced up towards the Big House once more. It stretched long enough for him to realise that it was a deliberate rather than circumstantial quietness. He turned back towards Jason and Leo to see them wearing identical expressions of incredulity. "What?"

Leo's surprise snapped with its usual speed into a grin. "You _are_ a lucky bastard! Man, I'd kill not to get sick ever."

"Is that really how it works, Nico?" Jason asked, a smile drawing across his face a moment later. "I didn't know that. When did you find out you had this sort of power?"

Nico shrugged. "I don't know if it's any particular power exactly. Maybe Hazel and I have just inherited really good immune systems?"

"I doubt it." Jason shook his head. "Even the hardiest people get sick sometimes. You mean, _never?_ "

"Not that I can remember."

"Damn, I wish I was a son of Hades," Leo muttered.

"Ha. Funny you should say that, seeing as you said the exact opposite _just_ last week."

Leo smirked. "Look at this, Jason. I think Nico just laughed. Rare sight, that is."

"I'm pretty sure that's just derision, Leo," Jason grinned.

"Thank you, Jason, for explaining the obvious to the simpleton of our group."

"Hey, are you calling me simple?"

"I do believe that's what I just said."

They descended into banter and teasing insults that had more than the odd elbow in the ribs or push to the shoulder. Nico found he was enjoying himself a little bit for the first time in days. He wouldn't admit it aloud but he missed being around Will. He'd grown so used to them spending almost every minute of the day together that he felt almost as though he was missing a limb. That feeling had grown only more pronounced after they'd fought, and Nico wondered how having such an explosive argument and getting so angry at Will could possibly make him actually like him _more_. It was illogical, but he couldn't deny it was the truth.

Finally, they subsided in their jostling games, falling into stillness and quietness but for Leo's discordant humming.

"Please stop that," Nico murmured.

"If you don't like it, go away."

"I was here first."

"You're the one who has a problem with my voice."

"To be fair, I'm pretty sure just about everyone would have a problem with your voice, Leo." Jason said with a small smile that took the sting out of his words.

"Thanks, Jason. Appreciate it," Leo replied with an equally stupidly harmless smile.

"Any time."

There was another moment of silence. Then Jason broke it as he turned to Nico. "You're really kind of upset about this, aren't you?"

Nico turned from where he'd been unconsciously staring once more at the Big House – okay, mostly glaring – and attempted to smooth his expression beneath Jason's expectant gaze. "What?"

"About Will kicking you out."

"I don't really care, actually."

Leo muttered something snide beneath his breath and Jason jabbed him hard enough to provoke a yelp of objection. Jason ignored him. "If you have such a problem with it, why don't you just go up and help out."

"He told me not to."

"When have you ever done what you've been told to?"

Nico gave a small smile. He liked Jason, and not just because they got on well enough. While someone like Annabeth or Hazel – or Will, for that matter – tended to act as his voice of reason, more often than not Jason would take the role of the 'what if' or the 'maybe just'. He wouldn't exactly urge Nico into something dangerous – even Jason was level-headed enough to know a threat when it stared him in the face – but it was nice just to have someone who at least sometimes aligned their words with Nico's thoughts.

"True."

"So why don't you?"

Nico shrugged, dropping his head back onto the fountain. "Will just seemed really worried. And, believe it or not, I'm not _always_ fond of pissing my boyfriend off. When he gets annoyed he's just sort of…"

Nico trailed off, but both Jason and Leo nodded in commiseration. Nico could have anticipated such a response from the pair of them. Both Piper and Calypso were at least nearly as strong-willed as was Will. They could probably relate to his situation better than most people could.

"Does he know you don't get sick?" Jason asked after another brief pause for thoughtful silence. "I mean, that you think you don't get sick?"

Nico shook his head. "We haven't even really talk about any of that except for the fact that I haven't had my shots. He kicked me out straight away and I haven't seen him since."

"Then go tell him," Leo prompted. In an awkward, ungainly and entirely unnecessary stretch of his foot over Jason's lap, he poked Nico in the side of the leg. Nico stared at his boot unblinkingly until he retracted it. "Will's being a… what was it you called him? A mother –"

"Hen, yeah, a mother hen," Jason confirmed, laughing as he nodded his understanding.

"Yeah, so he's probably overreacting a little bit. Just go and tell him. And, you know, you don't have to actually go _into_ the infirmary. You could just sort of yell it at him from the doorway or whatever."

Nico flicked his gaze between his two friends as they turned with once more identical expressions – of expectancy this time – towards him. He felt wrong for considering taking them up on their suggestion, which was a strange enough feeling itself. Nico _always_ did what he wanted. When had he begun to actually take orders, or even suggestions, from other people? Okay, maybe not just other people, but from Will at least.

_Since you started to care enough about him that you didn't want to make him angry, or upset, or sad, or worried, or…_

Nico pursed his lips at the thought. It was the truth, though. He didn't want to distress Will, especially when he was already highly strung with his own worries for _other_ people. But then, Nico was… was he worried? About Will? Or did he just want to be around him? He wasn't sure, but regardless of what reason drove him, Nico knew he wanted to be in infirmary.

Nodding decisively to the synchronous grins of his friends, Nico rose to his feet. "Alright, then."

"Good man," Jason said, climbing to his own feet and clapping Nico on the shoulder hard enough to knock him a step forwards. "Standing up for what you believe in. I'm proud of you."

"Oh Gods help me…"

"All the best facing off with your dragon-boyfriend," Leo added, grin flashing even wider.

"Dragon-boyfriend?"

"Yeah, you know, 'cause he spits fire at you when he's angry and he has his little nest up there in the Big House and…" He trailed off as Nico and Jason both stared at him blankly. "No? Well, whatever. Don't die from contracting a heinous disease."

"I'm pretty sure this fever thing that's going around wouldn't kill me even if I caught it," Nico said, turning and starting towards the infirmary.

"You never know. If you do survive, lend me some of your blood, will you?"

"Lend? Ew, Leo, what the hell?" Jason exclaimed.

Nico glanced over his shoulder and caught the entirely unbashful grin that Leo plastered upon his chin as he shrugged. "Okay, maybe not lend. But I've got to get me some of this sickness-less elixir you've got, Nico."

"That's his _blood_ , Leo."

"Which is why I asked for it."

"That's so twisted, I don't even…"

Their exchange faded as Nico, ignoring Leo's request and leaving his counterargument in the more than capable hands of Jason, strode up towards the Big House.

The door was open just a crack when he stepped up to the veranda. He eased it open on well-oiled hinges and peeked inside the dimly lit hallway that branched off directly into the infirmary as the front room.

It was pretty much exactly the same as it always was, but Nico looked upon the lengthy room with new eyes. It seemed like it had been longer than three days since he'd been inside and, after a moment of consideration, he realised that his brief exclusion from the infirmary was the longest he'd been so excluded from it in a 'time of crisis' since he and Will had started dating. The boredom and endless waiting of the past days made it seem like it had been longer.

He stepped inside and made his way down the aisle between the beds and barely spared a glance for the patients, mostly asleep, half-hidden by the white, shrouding curtains that he passed. There were about twelve all up by his count, and there appeared to have been a complete turnover since Nico had last visited. Ai had finally left – Nico had already known as he'd seen her just that morning at breakfast where she'd exclaimed over the apparent miracle workings of the kids of Apollo.

Those kids were drifting with their usual efficiency around the beds, down to the medicine cabinets, talking quietly to their fellow campers as they lay tucked abed. Nico nodded to Austin as he passed and caught Kayla's eye just before she turned towards Fionn and quickly called, "You owe me twenty bucks, Fionn! Told you he'd come in before the end of the week". Nico couldn't even find it within himself to feel disgruntled at being used in a bet as he passed her, shaking his head as he caught Fionn's distant reply of, "Just had to stay loyal to my cabin counsellor. I didn't actually _believe_ it".

Will was nowhere in sight, which was strange. At least not immediately in sight, not until little Zip bounced towards Nico and pointed him in the direction of the second living area at the end of the cabin. The crop of Will's curly head was just visible over the back of the cream-coloured two-seater and Nico headed straight towards it.

 _Don't tell me he's finally gained enough sense to sit down and rest for a second_ , he thought, faintly surprised. Will wasn't the kind of person to take a break from helping others until he passed out from sheer exhaustion. Nico hadn't seen such a situation arise before – thankfully – but he wouldn't put it past Will to do so.

Will wasn't taking a rest. At least not because he wanted to. Because he had to was the reality that quickly became apparent when Nico rounded the couch and saw his face.

No, he hadn't had a brief burst of sanity and clarity. Will was sick.

Nico nearly burst out laughing in genuine, teasing merriment, despite the fact that Will looked absolutely terrible and despite the fact that really, it was a bit horrifying to see him so. Nico even felt a touch of sympathy that he struggled to shunt aside. Will was pale, his skin washed from its usually healthy golden glow, his eyes heavy and red and his nose looked to have been rubbed raw. Chapped lips drew heavy breaths as his nose was evidently too blocked to act in their place, and there was a definite slump of exhaustion to his carriage that Will struggled to remedy the second that Nico stepped into his line of sight.

Nico folded his arms as Will fell wearily back into his seat, evidently giving up the fight against his weariness. He raised an eyebrow. "Well. Congratulations. You managed to make yourself sick."

"I'm not the only one from cabin seven to have gotten sick," Will muttered objectionably. His voice was thick and as clogged as his nose sounded when he sniffed. "And it's just a cold. I'm fine, just needed to take a break for a second."

"He nearly passed out," Kayla offered as she passed with arms full of used sheets.

Will half-turned to glare at his sister. "Thank you for that, Kayla, you're always such a help."

"Anytime."

Nico raised his eyebrows further and deliberately kept his lips clamped shut in muteness. It worked a treat, for Will seemed to grow more sheepish and uncomfortable the longer the silence extended. Finally, he sighed. "Alright, let me hear it."

Nico allowed himself a small smile. Only small, though, because he wasn't so heartless as to jeer in the face of his sick boyfriend. Even if he would have been entirely justified in doing so. "I guess it wasn't _me_ we should have been worrying about."

"It could have been," Will attempted, snuffling and pressing a crumpled tissue to his nose. "Probably a good thing that I kicked you out when I did because otherwise –"

"Nothing would have happened, most likely."

"It could have –"

"No, actually, turns out it probably couldn't have. Hazel and I think that we're naturally immune to most if not all illnesses anyway."

Will paused in his open-mouthed attempt to continue and blinked. He looked momentarily baffled, though the brief squeezing of his eyes closed and the slight shake of his head suggested that he thought his confusion more a product of his sickness-induced grogginess than any incomprehension on his part. "What?"

Nico shrugged casually. "Yeah, that's what we think. Probably something about being a child of Hades or something. We compared notes, though, a while ago. Neither of us has ever been sick that we can remember. And before you say anything, Hazel hasn't had any shots either."

Will stared at him in stupefaction. The expression was made more comical by the blotchiness of his face and the squinting of his eyes as though to simply look at Nico was making them water. "W-what?"

"Yeah, that's what we think."

"Since when?"

"I'm assuming since always."

"No, I mean – since when have you known?"

Nico pursed his lips thoughtfully for a moment. "Hm. We mentioned it to one another a couple of months ago when Frank got a stomach flu, but I've just never really thought about it much up till now."

Will blinked at him in squints once more. "You didn't think to maybe tell me this?"

"I just told you, I didn't really think about it."

"You, the boyfriend of a medic who treats sick people, didn't think to mention that you don't actually get sick yourself."

"No, apparently not."

Will gave a croaking, choked sound of disbelief. Then he shook his head, winced as it obviously shook something uncomfortably loose, and narrowed his eyes at Nico. "You don't know that for sure, though."

"Don't know…?"

"That you're immune. It could have just been luck."

Nico raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, sixteen years of luck. I should be a child of Tyche, really."

"It could be."

"You're looking for an excuse to justify your actions of kicking me out three days ago."

"I don't need to justify anything. Especially since it's true."

"Probably not, though."

"What is the likelihood of you actually having that sort of skill? Or luck, whatever." Will frowned, and Nico could see him fortifying himself against the unexpected revelation. "No, you need to get out of the infirmary right now before you do get sick."

"Will –"

"Seriously, I don't want you to get sick!"

 _Right. That's it._ Sighing, rolling his eyes, Nico leant forwards, grabbed Will behind his neck and pressed their lips together in a brief, chaste kiss. Nico wasn't particularly partial to such displays where anyone else could see, but exceptions had to be made when absolutely necessary. It was actually Will attempting to pull away from Nico this time, which was a strange experience in and of itself.

"Nico!" He blurted out in a squawk as soon as he pulled himself free. "Dammit, what the hell?"

"Now we'll really be able to see if I don't get sick. I think this whole exposure experiment is a good idea, actually." Nico ignored the faintly horrified expression on Will's face as he drew his eyes sidewards in mock thoughtfulness. "It would be kind of funny, actually, if I did have some sort of immunity. What with having a doctor for a boyfriend an all. Sort of ironic."

"You. Could. Get. Sick," Will said in clipped words.

"Yeah, well, then at least we'd know for sure."

"If you end up dying from this –"

"That's very dramatic of you, don't you think? Who ever died from a cough in this day and age?"

Will glared at him while Nico struggled not to smirk. He was detachedly aware of the strange role reversal they appeared to have assumed, which only made his struggles all the harder. "You'd manage. Just to spite me, I'd bet."

"I am a very spiteful person, I have to admit."

"I'd never forgive you for dying on me, you realise that."

"Well, then I'll have to try really, _really_ hard not to," Nico replied, and plopped himself down into the chair beside Will. He ignored his boyfriend's further protests and reprimands and instead leaned comfortably against his shoulder and pulled his console from his pocket and set about really enjoying himself for the first time in days. Strangely enough, just sitting beside Will – even a very sick Will – was the main drive for that enjoyment.

As it turned out, Nico didn't get sick. Will was apparently at war with himself, torn between relief, incredulity and even more profound relief at the possibility that Nico might not be _able_ to get sick, and mulish disgruntlement that he'd been wrong to worry so much. Nico took particular delight in prodding his stung pride at that last, and took every opportunity to do so.

He could anticipate the Epidemic Incident as being one he would refer to on numerous occasions in the future. It was a prime example of Will's overprotective stupidity being entirely unfounded.

Still, even unfounded as it was, Nico was oddly pleased for the fact. Because Will had been worried for him, and this time, when Nico recognised that worry, it wasn't shrouded by anger and overriding demands. It might have been wrong for him to think it, but Nico felt almost… happy for the fact.

There was something profoundly wonderful about having someone care about you enough to worry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hi again. Hope you liked the chapter. Yeah, I know Nico was a little bit heartless - bad, Nico! Bad! - but I feel that coddling and commiserating isn't exactly a part of his repertoire. At least not yet. In the future, maybe :)
> 
> Anyway, I should be updating within the week again (hopefully). If you have a chance to leave a word - question, suggestion or just wanted to say hi - please do. Thank you!


	5. First Sleepovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: the time Will fully came to realise why Nico didn’t sleep.

Very few people had seen inside Cabin Thirteen. There were speculations as to what it was like, that it was swathed in shadows and as cold as a graveyard, that semi-animated zombies filled most of the beds, that those beds were little more than cocoons of spider webs or ornamental coffins of blood-red lining and skeleton comforters. That to sleep a night in the Hades' cabin was to endure fitful darkness and a pervasive sense of foreboding.

Sadly enough, many of those speculations weren't all that far off the mark. Will was one of those few that had seen inside – actually seen – and he could say that it was far from being his favourite place on camp. It was far from being Nico's either, even if he did spend a whole lot of time inside; he claimed that he'd tried to redecorate but the cabin just 'didn't like it'. Whatever that meant.

It wasn't all that cold, though. Nor was it pervasively foreboding. And though it was dark, that was mostly because Nico neglected to light the actual flaming torches that lined the walls. There were coffins for beds and they did have red lining and sheets, but they actually looked remarkably more inviting than their structural morbidity would suggest. Definitely more likely to be the temporary and comfortable bedding of a resting vampire than that of a cadaver.

Will wasn't so taken with the shrine at the far end of the cabin, though. There was something a little - or very – creepy about the arrangement of skulls, bones and glittering jewels, even though most of those skulls appeared to have come from monsters rather than humans. Most of them. He didn't blame Nico for keeping it half-draped in a black sheet most of the time.

Will had stepped through the doorway several times in search of Nico though had never stayed for very long. Unlike most of the other cabins that seemed neutral towards intruders if not openly welcoming, there was a very definite sense of seclusion to Hades' cabin. As though it was questioning the very notion of Will's entry between its walls. Not that Will let it faze him, because he'd rather put up with that and spend time with Nico that wait outside by himself. Still, he was always thankful that Nico seemed largely inclined to spend most of their indoor time in cabin seven instead.

No, Will didn't particularly _want_ to go into cabin thirteen more than he had to. And he wouldn't have expressed any inclination to do so if not for one particular conversation that arose at the Apollo table of a dinnertime.

"Isn't it sort of creepy, though? I mean, it's always dark, and shadowy, and you're in there all by yourself."

Will glanced away from the conversation he'd been having with Kayla at Fionn's words. She was staring expectantly at Nico from across the table as she peeled green peas from their pods and popped them into her mouth with her finicky pickiness. Nico paused in the act of alleviating his burger of every hint of vegetable to regard her with hooded eyes.

"I like it dark."

"Obviously, being the son of Hades," Will expanded. Nico shot him a glance that told him exactly what he thought of the redundancy of his statement.

"But you spend so much time in our cabin, I'd think you were sort of coming to like things a little bit lighter," Fionn persisted. "It must get really dark in Hades' cabin at night."

"Yeah, well, that's what happens at night time, Fionn," Kayla said with a condescending smile to her younger sister.

"No, no, I mean in the cabin thirteen. Like, it's already really, really dark, and – do you even have lights in your cabin, Nico?"

Nico stared at Fionn unreadably, unblinkingly, for a long moment. Will wondered if he was more affronted or amused by her persistence; sometimes it was hard to tell the difference. "I do, yes. But I usually don't use them."

"Why not?"

"Nico can sort of see in the dark," Will explained. "Sort of."

"Oh, like a cat?"

"No," Nico said, just as Will nodded with a grin and a "Yes". He received another pointed glance for his efforts and a crushing heel into the top of his foot beneath the table. He thought one of his bones might have been mashed into a pulp and had to bite back a wince.

"It must get pretty lonely in there all by yourself," Fionn continued, oblivious as always to the effects of her blindly ploughing forth into a dangerous situation. "Your sister used to stay with you while she was here, right?"

"Yeah, Hazel and sometimes Frank," Nico said quietly, almost warily.

"Does anyone else ever stay over?"

Nico shrugged, batting Will's hands away as he deliberately gestured towards the discarded vegetable scattered about his plate. "Reyna did when she came to visit, but otherwise not really."

"Would you like to?"

"Like to what?"

"Have someone else sleep over in your cabin."

Nico stared at Fionn for a moment as though she was an idiot. "No. Why would I want that?"

"In case you get lonely."

"I don't get lonely."

"Bullshit," Will murmured under his breath. Nico drove his heel down once more onto his foot and he couldn't withhold a wince this time.

"Do you actually get zombies and skeletons wandering through your cabin at night?" Wesley asked, leaning into Fionn to include himself in the conversation.

"What?"

"Zombies. And skeletons," Kayla explained from beside Will, leaning around him to try and catch Nico's eye. "And wraiths and ghouls. Everyone wonders what kind of weird creatures come out at night, especially after that time that something screamed from inside a couple months ago. What was that all about?"

Nico slowly turned towards her and regarded her with the same blank stare he had Fionn. Will followed his gaze and noted in passing that they'd acquired something of an audience throughout the conversation. He wasn't surprised, given that there were always speculations surrounding Nico and his habits. If only he knew that remaining close-lipped and deflecting questions only made people more curious, manifesting the air of mystery that still shrouded him despite his stepping more into the going-ons of camp life.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Well? Do they?" Fionn asked.

"Does who what?"

"Zombies. And skeletons. And ghosts and stuff. Do they actually come out at night and all fill up the beds of your cabin?"

Nico drew his gaze around the small ring of Apollo's children, a noticeable portion of their greater number, and shook his head. "You people are all insane."

"Notice that he's not disputing our suggestions," Austin pointed out.

"Yeah, because they're stupid."

"Has anyone seen it to prove it, though?" Kayla asked, waving her fork at him.

"No. And you never will. Other people don't sleep in Hades' cabin. That's just how it is."

"Because they literally can't or because you don't want them to?" Kayla asked.

"Both," Nico said stubbornly, frowning and folding his arms across the table before him.

Will could have anticipated the response of his half-siblings. He did, really, though wasn't quick enough to divert their request before it arose. Grinning, Kayla leant further around Will and sharpened her unwavering stare. "You know what this means, right? We're going to have to sacrifice one of our number."

"What?" Nico said flatly.

"Someone will have to sleep overnight in Cabin Thirteen. Just so we can see if they can live to tell the tale."

Nico regarded the rapidly spreading grins of the Apollo members around him. "No. You're all idiots. I don't want any of you sleeping in my cabin with me."

 _"Your_ cabin." Kayla smirked. "That's a little presumptuous of you, don't you think?"

"Do you see any other kids of Hades around?"

"Fair call. But that's not a good enough reason." Kayla grinned, grazing her gaze around the table. "We have a self-appointed quest, my friends."

A babble of amused enthusiasm arose even as Nico's scowl deepened. Deepened and sharpened slightly with something that Will doubted anyone else even noticed. It looked just faintly like worry.

Was he really so averse to anyone else sleeping in his cabin? Or was it for other reasons? Was it really dangerous for anyone else but a child of Hades? But then, Reyna had slept in there, and Nico said Frank did too, so…

Making a quick decision, Will cleared his throat loud enough to quell the abrupt uprising of noise. "I'll do it."

"Will, my man!" Wesley reached across the table to clap a hand on Will's shoulder. "Taking one for the team like a real trooper."

"On you, Will."

"Of course you would…"

"Make sure you take notes, yeah? Give us the full blow-by-blow."

Will shook his head, rolling his eyes. "You guys are worse than Aphrodite's kids, you gossip so much."

"Don't be so insulting, Will," Kayla sniffed. "This is an important investigation we're setting you on here. Real solid research."

"Right. I'm sure."

The talk descended into speculations, into bets placed as to whether Will would survive the night and, if he did, what degree of mutilation he would suffer. Will let them talk, unfazed by the increasingly gruesome suggestions. Or at least not fazed much.

He did notice, however, that Nico fell silent throughout dinner thenceforth. His expression was cast into stubborn blankness, the resolution of 'attempting to hide his thoughts' that Will had witnessed on numerous occasions before. That, alongside the memory of the worry he'd briefly witnessed, caused Will to frown. He didn't like it when Nico became serious like that, when he became distant. It ended up worrying him, too, even if he was still just a little curious. He and Nico had never had any sleepover of sorts, not in the entire time they'd been boyfriends. Not even in Apollo's cabin. It was as exciting as it was nerve-wracking.

Leaning towards his boyfriend, Will thrust his nervousness aside – what was there even to be nervous about, really? – and dropped his voice low. "Sorry about this. You seemed kind of annoyed about it, but they're persistent and I knew they wouldn't let it drop when the idea struck. I figured at least if it was me it wouldn't be quite so bad."

Nico remained silent for a moment staring at his plate and his abandoned dinner before he turned towards Will. Surprisingly he didn't scowl or brush aside Will's words but instead offered a small smile that possibly even held a hint of gratitude. "Thanks."

Will stared at him, faintly incredulous. "You really mean that?"

 _Then_ came the eye roll, and abruptly Nico's expression shifted from blank and closed to openly condescending. "Is that so hard to believe?"

"Coming from you? Definitely."

"Shut up, Will. Besides, it's only fair, really, that you have to come to _my_ cabin every once in a while. I've spent more than enough time in yours."

"Yeah, but never sleeping there."

"That's because all you have to offer for a bed are hospital beds.."

"There's nothing wrong with those beds."

"The fact that your spare beds are _hospital_ beds, Will, for _sick_ people, makes it wrong."

Will drew a grin upon his face that was only half-forced. "They're only used when the infirmary fill out, you know. And besides, for sick people? I think that would mean you'd fit into it perfectly."

Thankfully, the heavy mood lifted after that, and talk of spending the night just the two of them in Hades' cabin was lost to disregard. Will didn't let himself pause to contemplate once more that it would be the first time he and Nico would actually be sleeping next to one another, let alone _only_ them. The looming prospect of a night filled with shadows and chilling gloom was a bit of a deterrent that he'd rather not consider at all.

It wasn't as bad as he'd anticipated. In many ways, it wasn't bad at all. They spent the growing evening slouched across the thinly cushioned but unexpectedly comfortable couch – red and black, of course – and continuing their marathon of _Supernatural_ when they'd finally moved from playing video games. Will had made a point of urging Nico towards some of his favourite TV series after he'd become accustomed to the fact that televisions and computers weren't likely to bite his hand off the moment he attempted to use them. So far they were doing rather well – Will was quite proud of the fact that they'd actually made it halfway through the series, with several others already tucked beneath their belts.

He didn't make it to bed, however, didn't manage to draw himself towards the coffins from the couch before the laptop playing reels of monsters that truly looked just a little too realistic. Instead, Will felt his eyes droop and, slumping into Nico, let himself fall towards sleep. It was oddly comfortable to lie with his legs hooked over the end of the couch, head pillowed against Nico's shoulder, and the beckoning fingers of slumber were difficult to deny. How could he not give into them, with the pervasive darkness of the cabin broken only by the flickering of the laptop screen and the mellow warmth that swirled from the walls? Will made a mental note as his eyes slipped shut to tell Fionn that it was _not,_ in fact, as cold as a graveyard.

He woke with a crick in his neck and the knowledge that he had no idea what had dragged him from sleep. It was still dark, but even darker than it had been for the light of the laptop screen had been switched off. Will blinked for a moment, his eyes adjusting to the darkness as he looked around himself.

He was still on the couch – really, he hadn't expected anything other – and his legs still hooked over the arm, numbed from shorted circulation so that his toes tingled. Will pulled his legs back onto the cushions as he glanced back in the other direction to see that he still half rested upon Nico, though upon his lap rather than his shoulder. And Nico –

Nico was wedged into the corner of the couch, one elbow propped against the arm and holding his chin up while the other spread open a thick book. How he managed to read in such darkness Will didn't know – surely his night vision couldn't be that acute; Will could hardly make out his face in the darkness – but he appeared intent enough. He very obviously wasn't sleeping either.

"What are you doing?"

Nico turned his head slightly towards Will and, though he couldn't make out his expression in the darkness and over the slight distance between them, Will speculated that he could feel him roll his eyes. "Isn't it obvious? I'm reading."

"It is pretty obvious," Will agreed, nodding. "I meant why aren't you asleep. It's feels like it's after midnight, right?"

"One-thirty," Nico confirmed.

Will nodded. He'd vaguely known as much. As a child of Apollo, he had a sort of internal clock for that sort of thing, a tendency towards knowing where exactly the sun was situated in the sky, or, in the case of night time, how far off it was until it arose. "Right. One-thirty. You should sleep. Your best sleep happens before midnight, you know."

"I'll keep that in mind for next time, then. Wasted effort now."

Pushing himself upwards into a slouching sitting position, Will scrubbed at his eyes as he frowned. "Do you always stay up so late?"

"Most of the time."

"What time do you go to sleep?"

Nico only shrugged and Will's frown deepened. True, Nico might whinge about and bemoan his overprotectiveness, that he was too demanding with his suggestions to meet the recommended hours of sleep, and nutrition, and sun exposure, but Will didn't care. He _was_ a doctor after all, even if no one outside of Camp Half-Blood would recognise him as such.

"Nico, that's not healthy."

"I'm not tired. I wouldn't be able to sleep anyway."

"Have you tried taking something, then? Maybe some chamomile tea?"

Nico snorted just loud enough for Will to hear him. "What are you, my mother?"

"Just looking out for you. Isn't that what boyfriends are supposed to do?"

"Thanks, but I don't need it."

"Nico –"

"Will."

Nico's tone brooked no further argument. Will wouldn't have been surprised if he'd climbed from the couch and abandoned Will to the darkness of the cabin had he persisted with his suggestions. And though it wasn't quite as bad as he'd anticipated – Will hadn't seen a single ghost since he'd arrived – he wasn't keen to tempt fate with the absence of the son of Hades. The foreboding deterrence had eased throughout the night but he didn't like his chances without Nico alongside him.

With a sigh, Will felt his shoulders slump in defeat. "Alright, then. I won't nag, or tell you that you have to go to sleep. But can you at least try and rest or something? You don't have to _sleep_ , exactly, but, you know, let your mind rest or whatever."

"Are you asking me to put my book down?"

"I'm asking you to put your book down."

There must have been something in Will's tone, some note of sincerity, perhaps a faint plea that nudged Nico towards compliance, for he remained objectionably silent for only a moment longer. Then he sighed and, folding the book closed and dropping it to the floor, turned to face him with a fold of his arms. Will could only make out the pale oval of Nico's face through the darkness, though he considered that he could physically feel the radiation of his scowl. For once, it barely elicited a slight smile from Will – it didn't really seem all that funny at the moment. "There. Happy?"

"Exceptionally," Will said. Then, without waiting for further reply and ignoring the grumbles and mutters of objection, he settled himself against Nico into the lazing slouch he'd assumed before.

"You call this comfortably resting?" Nico muttered.

"I'm comfortable. And I'm resting, so yes. You should try it too."

"What, with you lying all over me like a human blanket."

"I'm just sharing body warmth. You should be thanking me."

"Oh, well in that case, thank you for smothering me, you bloody space heater."

"Space heater? That's a new one," Will murmured, already closing his eyes and falling prey to the tentative jaws of sleep once more. In spite of his concern for the fact that Nico apparently _didn't_ sleep, the pull of oblivion was just a little too much to resist. He'd barely fully woken up all that much as it was. "Just try and close your eyes and calm your thoughts down. Maybe you'll fall to sleep then. No reading, though. You're probably overstimulating yourself or something."

Nico grumbled something that sounded to Will's ears like "stop using hypothetical reasoning in a theoretical explanation" before subsiding. Will found himself smiling as he drifted back to sleep. _That_ sounded more like the usual Nico, and a relief it was to hear.

The second time he woke was with jolt. That which had drawn him from unconsciousness was very distinct, sudden and sharp, and still sounding in a murmur punctuated by a faint cry. This time, Will blinked his eyes open in sudden wide wakefulness with the surety that something was wrong.

He'd fallen from 'blanketing' Nico to more completely sprawling across the cushions but more because Nico had curled himself into an impossibly tight ball in his corner of the couch. Will couldn't make out his face in the darkness as he propped himself up to sitting but it hardly mattered. It was apparent where the sound had come from as it still ensued with muttering whimpers reminiscent of a terrified puppy.

He couldn't really see, though, and it suddenly vexed Will that he was so blinded. Taking a deep breath, he released it in a forced exhalation that drew upon the heat within him. Slowly, like a dimmer light gradually urged towards brightness, a golden yellow glow rose from his skin in a shallow, pulsing light. Not strong, but enough to see by. Enough to see what he could of Nico's face as it was half-turned away from him.

Reaching out towards him, Will gripped him gently on the shoulder. The contrast of his faintly glowing fingers to the darkness of Nico's jumper was as contrasting as black and white. He could make out Nico's trembling, the compulsive twitches quivering through his frame. He still appeared to be asleep but it was obvious to anyone who was listening that he was fighting a nightmare. There was pain and fear in his muffled murmurs that put Will in mind of the Christmas when he'd returned from seeing his reborn sister. An upwelling of protective sorrow flooded through him and he felt like he understood Nico just a little more.

 _Oh. So this is why he doesn't like to sleep. Maybe it's why he was worried at having someone else come into his cabin? Because he didn't want anyone to know he had nightmares?_ And then with a frown, _Why didn't he tell me?_

Shunting aside the query, Will edged along the couch. Such questions couldn't be answered now, nor necessarily should they be. It was Nico's right to have privacy and he shouldn't have to tell Will everything, even if he was his boyfriend. Even if Will did want to know. Squeezing his fingers, he shook Nico's shoulder gently, his light wavering.

"Nico? Hey, Nico, it's alright."

The spasms of shivering only intensified into bodily shakes and somehow Nico seemed to curl even further into himself. The whimpers grew louder and, in rising concern, Will slid forwards until he was almost leaning over him. He shook Nico's shoulder harder, speaking louder as the lingering traces of sleep fell from his voice. "Nico? Nico, wake up. Come on, you're alright. It's just a nightmare. Come on, wake up."

He gave a slightly harder squeeze, his voice rising, and abruptly Nico snapped alert. An arm rose to strike at Will aggressively even before he untucked himself from his curl and Will only just managed to catch his wrist before he was whacked in the face. An instant later and Nico was jerking himself backwards into the couch, whipping around to face Will and fully reveal a face paler than it had been before. This close, with the radiance of his own light, Will could make out his expression of confusion and grogginess, the rapid blinking as he swum into consciousness and the worry, the almost-fear, tightening his face.

"Hey, hey, hey, it's okay," Will hastened to assure him. The hand still grasping Nico's shoulder patted gently while his other curled around Nico's offensively raised arm in an attempt to restrain his straining, instinctive aggression. "You're okay, Nico. You're okay. It was just a nightmare."

Nico sat frozen for a moment longer, his face tight and eyes blinking rapidly. Then, as abruptly as he'd awoken, as he'd frozen into tightness, he fell to panting that were so heavy his gasps were nearly sobs. He seemed to deflate, chin dropping to his chest and shoulders hunching as if suddenly weighted by exhaustion. His upraised arm only remained so because Will maintained his grasp upon it, tension dropping and hanging limply.

Without thought, Will folded around him. Dropping his handholds, he reached forwards and wrapped both arms around Nico as he continued to pant in near sobs, as he kept shaking as though wracked by a heavy fever. Nico didn't respond, didn't make an effort to return the embrace and sat tensely with muscles quivering. But he didn't pull away. Will thought that was something at least.

They simply sat for a time. Will didn't know for how long, keeping his arms locked and head resting upon Nico's shoulder. He maintained that hold as Nico's heavy breathing slowly calmed, as his trembles reduced to shivers and finally stopped entirely. In the darkness of Cabin Thirteen, the darkness broken only by the mellow glow that Will maintained, they sat in one another's warmth, unspeaking and without presumption.

Finally, Nico heaved a gushing sigh and the last of the tension within him seemed to dissipate. Will felt the slow, hesitant edging of his arms around his waist, returning the embrace Will offered against his direct request. Will turned his head towards Nico slightly, towards his hidden face with forehead pressed firmly against Will's shoulder. "Nightmares?"

"Mm."

"Does that happen often?"

"Mm."

The non-committal reply could have been a yes or a no, but Will already knew without asking. He'd simply wanted to check if Nico was ready to admit it, if he felt inclined to talk about it. Evidently he wasn't.

Breathing a sigh of his own, Will turned his head back to resting more comfortably upon Nico's shoulder. He felt for his boyfriend, for the lonely son of Hades that spent sleepless nights in his father's cabin, and felt only saddened that he couldn't offer anything more than a hug and a murmur of supportive and effectively useless words. Finally, Will had an explanation, a reason for the late night practice sessions that, though explained away well enough, had always been somehow lacking in validity. Nico didn't want to sleep; it as simple and complicated as that. Will could fight monsters as well as any other demigod, but these sorts of demons couldn't be beaten so easily.

"You should sleep," he murmured into Nico's shoulder. "Nightmares are tiring."

"Don't want to," Nico muttered in reply. His words were nearly inaudible through the muffling of Will's shoulder.

"Then just rest. I'll just… I think I'm just going to sit here hugging you, if it's all the same to you."

"Doubt I could stop you," Nico replied. "Stupid space heater."

Will gave a hitching chuckle that held little actual mirth and only tightened his hold around Nico's waist. He was gratified to feel Nico return the embrace just as tightly.

They sat leaning into one another for the rest of the night – all two hours remaining. Will wasn't sure if either of them actually slept. He knew he didn't, and though they didn't speak until dawn he doubted Nico did either.

When the hesitant glow of morning crept into the cabin to mingle with Will's own light, they finally drew apart from one another. Neither said a word about what had happened, their sombre mood persisting as they made their way down to breakfast together and were assaulted by the raucous questioning of the rest of the Apollo cabin. Will put on a brave face, drawing a smile upon his lips, and saw Nico do exactly the same in his own way, falling into his usual bored dismissiveness that he so frequently adopted. The sight of it arising only made Will wonder how often he'd done as much before, deliberately shunting whatever monsters wrought havoc of his dreams from his mind as he rose from bed each day.

Or didn't. Maybe he really didn't sleep at all.

Not much changed after that. Will remained close-lipped about the 'true horrors' of the Hades cabin, quickly falling into the taunting evasiveness that Nico unintentionally assumed when drilled about the reality of his sleeping quarters, and actually genuinely laughing at the badgering and pleading of his siblings. The children of Apollo still treated Nico as they always did, as had become the norm, and Will and Nico still acted like the often-bantering boyfriends that they were.

Except that after that, Will made a point of sleeping in the bed next to Nico every night. Nothing more than sleeping but he made sure he was there. If he couldn't fix the problem, couldn't heal Nico nor talk the nightmares out with him, then at least he could witness his struggles and support him as he fought them by himself. Whether it was in cabin seven or cabin thirteen – for Nico had finally deigned to 'sleep' in Apollo's cabin after their first sleepover – Will made a point of ignoring his rolled eyes, his scowling, his grumbling about how he didn't need a babysitter. It was actually easier to ignore than Will had anticipated; his belief of Nico's sincerity in disregarding him was challenged every time he recalled the hours they'd spent sitting upon the couch in wakefulness and supportive companionship.

And if he couldn't help him, then at least Will could hold Nico when he trembled with a nightmare, when he muttered and whimpered in his sleep for the scant times he managed more than brief shut-eye. He could alleviate the heavy darkness that could so easily hide the lurking monsters with his own light. Sometimes, when they were particularly fierce, Will would wake Nico up himself. Other times he would simply hug him until his shivering ceased and his mutters and sobs faded. Will doubted that he caught every time they happened – he didn't wake every night, and many nights he knew he fell into slumber when Nico didn't sleep a wink – but he tried. He wanted to try. He _wanted._

After all, Nico _was_ his boyfriend. And that was what boyfriends did.


	6. First Attempts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: This chapter contains explicit content. If you don't like it, sorry, but I'm not really inclined to change it so...

Their first attempt was a disaster.

They'd agreed to wait until they were both seventeen at their youngest. Legal age and all that, and surprisingly, despite the fervent desire on both their parts to disregard such considerations, it was one of the few things that they didn't argue about. If only Nico had known that their age would be the least of their problems. The very least.

He was glad it had been in the privacy of Hades' cabin, because at least in there it was dark enough for Nico to hide his mortified blush. Even so, as he and Will sat on the floor next to one another, Nico couldn't help but attempt to hide his face. They were barely and haphazardly dressed, backs pressed against the wall at the far end of the cabin and fidgeting in awkward silence. Knees drawn to his chest and one arm hooked around them, Nico buried his head in the even darker shadows between and hoped to the Gods that he would simply implode rather than sit in the horrifying embarrassment a moment longer. From the heat of his cheeks – Nico never blushed! Why was this _happening_? – such a thing didn't seem all that unlikely.

But throughout it all, throughout the embarrassment and humiliation, they held hands. Nico still struggled a little to do so in public, and yet he now clutched Will's hand like a lifeline. It was his only reassurance that what he was experiencing wasn't entirely removed from where everybody else on the face of the earth was, that he wasn't floating adrift. Because Will was feeling it too. He'd seen his face.

The silence stretched. Nico didn't know how long it had been going for. It was hard to judge time between the endless repetitions of _oh Gods, so embarrassing, what was that even -? How did we -? How embarrassing! Oh Gods…_ His heartbeat throbbed in his ears and it sounded almost as though the crazed pace was laughing at him for his foolishness.

Finally, Will spoke. Of course it would be Will out of the two of them to speak first. Or at least to try to speak. He cleared his throat but his voice was still barely more than a strained croak. "I think we should… um…"

Then silence once more. Awkward silence. But throughout it all, they held each other's hands as their sole point of contact and only squeezed them progressively tighter between them.

Minutes – or perhaps hours – later, Will spoke again. "Nico?"

The word was a question, a request, and Nico cringed at its suggestion. He didn't want to clamber from the protective darkness that he'd buried himself in, the darkness that, even if only momentarily, hid his embarrassment from the world. But in that single word, Nico could discern Will's own mortification just as he heard the steeling of his willpower and the effort it took to attempt to patch up the situation. With a struggle, Nico turned his head slowly towards his boyfriend.

Will had his legs crossed and shoulders hunched, bowed nearly double in a pose that made him look significantly smaller than he was. He had an elbow propped against one knee, the heel of his hand pressing firmly into his lowered forehead. He was glancing sideways, however, head half-turned towards Nico so that the lingering traces of his own vibrant blush could still be seen.

It actually made Nico feel a little better to see that flush upon Will's cheeks. It meant he wasn't the only one lit up like a light bulb. Even if Will did tend to blush more easily than Nico did, it was a comfort.

Will gave a tentative, sheepish smile when he met Nico's gaze that Nico wouldn't have been able to return even if he didn't feel so horribly embarrassed. "I'm sorry."

Shaking his head and closing his eyes briefly, Nico swallowed past the dryness in his throat. "Why are you apologising?" His voice was barely above a whisper.

"Because I screwed up?"

"No more than I did. I feel like it was a combined effort on both our parts."

"Still, I'm sorry it happened so… um…"

"Disastrously?"

Will winced. "That's a little blunt."

"But true," Nico muttered, dropping his cheek onto his knees as his thoughts drifted back to what had happened that afternoon and – _no, don't think about it. I don't think I ever want to think about it ever again. Ever_.

Will nodded into his hand, gaze dropping down to his crossed legs. "I guess you're right." With a sigh, he seemed to visibly fortify himself, pushed his forehead off his hand and rocked backwards to lean against the wall. His head tipped back and he stares at the ceiling for a moment in silence. Then he tilted his head towards Nico once more and the squeeze he gave to his hand held the confidence, the care, the support and the empathy that was only glimpsed in his expression. Nico hoped his own grasp – embarrassing as it still sometimes felt to hold hands – was even half as supportive.

"I think," Will began with an audible swallow, and Nico got the sense that he was wrangling his embarrassment into a box to lock it away. "That we should maybe do a bit more research for next time."

"Next time?" Nico asked. He hadn't been entirely sure that there would be a next time after the events of that afternoon. He wasn't sure if he particularly wanted one either until moments ago when his mortification had begun to dampen slightly with Will's words. And research… they'd done a little bit – of course they had; neither had really known what they were doing in the first place – but it had been almost as embarrassing to explore the internet and see the pictures – _oh Gods, the pictures_ – as it had been to try any of it out.

To try, and err stupendously.

Will's face tightened and his hand abruptly trembled slightly before he visibly stilled it. "Unless you didn't want a next time?"

Finally Nico lifted his head entirely from his knees. His embarrassment still remained, but it was a little more manageable now. All because Nico was noticeably witnessing the fact that Will was just as embarrassed as he was and, more than that, that despite his apparent optimism and disregard for that embarrassment, he needed the reassurance too. Threading his fingers through Will's, Nico pursed his lips and gave a frown that he hoped was as casual as those he normally gave. "I wasn't sure that you would have wanted to, is all."

Will visibly relaxed. He seemed to sag slightly, his head rocking on the wall. The small smile he offered Nico was filled with relief. "We screwed up once, Nico. That doesn't mean I never want to try again."

"Then that's what we'll do." Nico nodded more decisively than he felt. "We'll r-research and then we'll… try again." Nico wasn't sure how ready he'd be, how soon he would be _able_ to try again, but he would try. It would be as much because he wanted it to work as because he wanted to make Will happy with his reattempt.

Will heaved a heavy sigh that ended with a bubbling chuckle of amusement. Or relief. Yes, it definitely sounded more like relief than actual amusement. "Then that's what we'll do. We'll just have to try again until we work it out."

"Right. Practice makes perfect is how the old saying goes, right?"

Will snorted. Each passing second seemed to relax him further, drawing the tension from him as the flush drained from his cheeks. "I never thought I'd hear you say something like that."

Nico frowned. "Why? Aren't I allowed to drop the odd cliché every now and again?"

"Not that. I just didn't expect it." Will was definitely smiling now, a smile of that mounting relief that Nico was only just feeling himself, and a faint weariness as though the emotional blow of embarrassment had been physically tiring too. With a sigh, Will slid along the wall until he was sitting more closely to Nico, legs just touching. He dropped his head onto Nico's shoulder, shifting their clasped hands to rest in his own lap. They sat in silence for another moment as Nico fought to similarly rid himself of the effects of their first attempt.

"Hey, Nico?"

"What?"

Will twisted his head on Nico's shoulder to glance up at him. His face was cast in an expression of intensity, unexpected after their light-hearted exchange. Even the smile was mostly faded from his lips. "What?" Nico asked again, slightly wary.

"Just… thanks for not taking off. I know you usually… I mean, sometimes you'd just shadow travel when you freak out about something. And I just… thanks for not leaving."

Nico wanted to object. He wanted to reply that of course he wouldn't 'take off', that he wouldn't do a runner just because he was embarrassed. But if he was being truthful with himself, which for some reason in that moment he was, he couldn't deny that Will was accurate in his description of such a flighty response. As cowardly as it might seem, Nico was realistic enough to recognise that he was indeed prone to just… leaving.

He shrugged, rocking Will's head on his shoulder slightly. "No problem. Doubt I'd have even been able to shadow travel away anyway, what with you hanging onto me so tight."

Will gave a mumbled chuckle. He likely heard the fallacy in Nico's words, but he didn't comment upon it. Nico was grateful for that, at least. Disaster though it may have been, he felt oddly as though they had become closer for the failure of an experience.

* * *

The second attempt was just as disastrous, but for an entirely different reason.

It took a while for them both to work up the courage to try again, and not just because extensive research was involved. Nico was relieved to realise that it wasn't just he who felt embarrassed for the situation; for all of his optimism and bravado, Will was definitely feeling the hesitancy too. That in itself actually helped Nico to build his own resilience.

They were in Hades' cabin again. Of course they were, for they could hardly attempt any form of intimacy in the midst of the rest of Apollo's cabin. Will might joke about it, but Nico knew he was no more inclined to having an audience than Nico was himself. Besides, Hades' cabin hardly seemed as intimidating to Will anymore; Nico could leave him inside alone for a good couple of minutes without his company before he started to get antsy. He knew because he'd tested it.

They didn't plan it exactly. It simply happened one morning when, after breakfast, they'd retreated back to Cabin Thirteen for a spell before heading down to the archery range because Will "thought he should practice every now and then". As if he didn't practice enough. Lounging on the couch together, the time had seemed just… right.

Nico wasn't even sure which of them had actually initiated it, but somehow, within minutes they'd descended into lip-locking and tugging at clothes, clambering on top of one another and grasping at bared arms and naked shoulders. Nico had never seen himself as someone to lose their sense of reality, to become lost in the moment, but with his tongue wrapped around Will's and arms locked around his neck he thought he would come close.

Of course someone would interrupt. In the cabin that literally _no one_ just barged into, of course someone would choose _that_ day and _that_ moment to burst through the door.

"Nico, look who came by to visi- oh!"

Nico bodily fell off the couch, off of Will and smacked into the floor with jarring crash. He barely even noticed, so fierce was his absolute horror. It hardly helped when Will nearly tumbled from the couch on top of him and crouched beside him with a frantic question of "Gods, are you alright?" His voice was pitched about an octave higher than it usually was and, eyes widened, his cheeks shone a vibrant red warm enough to rival the sun.

 _Oh Gods, oh Gods, you've_ got _to be_ kidding _me! Of all the bloody times –_

Nico couldn't bring himself to stand up. He couldn't rise to his feet to face Leo where he stood just inside the flung-open door, or Hazel and Frank whose startled expressions he'd just glimpsed in the split second before his body had tried to throw itself through the floor into Tartarus. Nico slapped a hand across him face and hunched his shoulders and just _prayed_ that they would leave. That they'd hopefully forget everything they'd momentarily glimpsed.

There was silence in the cabin for a moment, silence in which Nico stared with wide-eyed horror at Will's own mortified expression through his fingers. Then there was a stuttering and Hazel – Gods bless Hazel and her kind heart – cleared her throat and squeaked, "So sorry for the intrusion, we should have knocked, really sorry about that, Nico, Will, we'll come by later and have a chat, just dropped over from New Rome for a day or two to say hi and –" She cut off her babbling of profuse apology and explanation and, with the distinctive click of footsteps, evidently charged through the door once more with a, "Come on, Frank, we really should have probably gone to visit Chiron first anyway."

The sound of her hasty retreat clattering across the cabin veranda was coupled with stumbles that Nico could only suppose belonged to Frank as she dragged him after her. He didn't know for sure and wouldn't dare to check.

A moment later, when Nico had almost forgotten he was there – how he could have forgotten he didn't know but somehow he'd managed – Leo burst out laughing. Nico wished he had his Stygian sword in hand so that he could lop his head off – or perhaps Nico's own head off – but he didn't so settled for burying his face further into his hands. Will looked like he was about ready to sink into the floor. His bare shoulders, the golden skin that even in his utter embarrassment Nico could still somehow admire, were hunched and his blond curls falling across his face as he dropped his chin. That was definitely speaking for itself; Will was usually the confident one, the more proactive of the two of them, yet he remained very decidedly close-lipped.

Leo's laughter was actually echoing through the cabin when Nico finally managed to claw his way from his mortification for long enough to put a stop to it. "For Gods' sake, Valdez, shut up and fuck off!"

Unfortunately, his words only made Leo laugh harder. Even so, he seemed to recognise Nico's desperation through his accusing aggression and actually responded to it with something other than playful taunts. Or at least in addition to taunts. "Alright, alright, I'll leave you two lovebirds to it. Never let it be said that Valdez was one to stand in the way of love."

"Get out," Nico reattempted, and hoped the near sob of desperation and thick embarrassment wasn't too evident in his tone.

Leo laughed once more, but then, in the distance, Nico heard the blessed voice of his sister's call. "Leo! Hurry up and get your butt out here!"

"Coming, coming!" Leo called in reply. As his footsteps retreated, however, he evidently couldn't withhold from dropping one last taunt. "Nico, Will, congratulations, _mis amigos_. You have my blessing. Onwards!" Then he left with a resounding slam of the door.

Nico and Will lay on the floor beside the couch in silence for a long moment. A long, awkward moment in which they both stared unblinkingly at one another. Nico, finally lowering his hand from his face, searched Will's gaze, looking for hesitancy and regret beneath the mortification. He wasn't entirely sure whether it was a good thing that he couldn't see any.

No, that was wrong. It was a good thing. It was. They had been interrupted almost before they'd begun anything noteworthy, and horrified at the thought of his little sister seeing him and Will in such a compromising position, Nico didn't regret what had happened _before_ the interruption.

Even so, that understanding didn't stop him from reaching for his discarded shirt and fumbling it back on. He sincerely doubted that Will wished to continue where they'd left off and knew for certain that he didn't. It was just… the moment was lost. For now, at least.

"I think…" Will began, as he slipped his own shirt over his head.

"That we need a lock on the cabin door?"

"I was thinking that exactly."

"Definitely."

And that was the last they said on the matter, as forcibly discarding the incident as they had their first attempt. And, to Nico's relief, Hazel appeared to have worked some magic of some kind – maybe actual magic – to silence Leo from retelling the encounter over lunch. Maybe not make him forget, however, since Nico was certain that he was the subject of more than one leering glance from the son of Hephaestus throughout the course of the day.

But Will didn't seem all that concerned. Or at least after his embarrassment had died he didn't. It did so more quickly than last time too, as it surprisingly did with Nico, which he took to be a progression in their mental fortifications. It went without saying that they would try again.

Maybe not right away, but they would.

* * *

Nico wasn't exactly sure how the double bed came to appear in Cabin Thirteen. He hoped – sincerely hoped – that it was simply the magic of the cabin that had brought it into existence, but he wasn't sure. It certainly seemed unlikely that Hades would have gifted it to him, what with the certainty of his understanding of what would surely happen in said bed, but then the only other person who could have assigned the new bedding was Persephone and Nico doubted she would have done it even more. Persephone had never really liked Nico.

Its appearance woke Nico and Will both up in the middle of the night with a loud, cracking pop. Nico, who had only really been dozing as he tended to do more than sleep, pushed himself up from his recline upon the couch and peered across the room. Night vision kicking into gear as it always did, he immediately saw the four poster bed standing at the end of the row of coffin-beds, replacing where once two had sat and resplendent in gossamer black curtains that looked like spider webs, thick black blankets and satiny red sheets poking out from beneath the doona.

Will groggily drew himself up from where he'd been sleeping practically on top of Nico and turned to blink across the room too. It took him a little longer to realise what had changed, and Nico wasn't sure whether that was due to his sleepiness, his lack of vision or his incomprehension. When he spoke it was bordering on hysterical bubbles of amusement. "Huh. Well, that could come in handy."

The bed was effectively exchanged for their couch after that. Most nights, actually, Nico found that he and Will shared the bed. Just to sleep, though. Nothing more. At least not at first.

It was one such night that they fell into intimacy quite as unexpectedly as had the previous disastrous attempt when they'd been so rudely interrupted. Or, well… rude on Leo's part. Nico couldn't bring himself to blame Hazel and Frank was just as likely oblivious to what had happened at all. Nico didn't even know if Frank had seen anything. He sorely hoped he hadn't.

Once more, Nico wasn't entirely sure who initiated it. He found that he didn't much care to point fingers or make condescending suggestions as they lay side by side, lost in the haziness of kissing and touching. Clothes were fumbled from limbs, a process difficult to manage when neither Nico nor Will seemed particularly inclined to pause in their kissing to focus on what their hands were doing.

Nico did pause, however, when they were both fully disrobed and lying alongside one another. He couldn't help himself; it was the first time that he'd actually seen Will completely naked and he found it hard to blink for the prospect of looking away even for a split second. Drawing his eyes along his long body at his side, over the expanse of golden brown skin that flickered paler in the dim light of Hades' cabin, he tentatively stroked his fingers over Will's arm, down his thigh, across the faintly visible ribbing along his chest and up to his face. His fingers brushed across Will's cheekbone for a moment, sweeping lightly though his hair as he met his gaze.

Nico wasn't one for contact. He didn't like it, not really. There were times, like when he hugged Hazel, or when Percy ruffled his hair or Jason gave him a playful punch to the shoulder, when he didn't mind it so much. And when he was lost in a nightmare and bodily pulled from the dark depths of his terror as Will wrapped him in a firm and unwavering embrace… he liked that, too. Probably liked that most of all, and not only because of the relief he felt in escaping the conjured chaos in his mind.

But normal touching? Not really. He was making an effort to try to accommodate such casual contact because he knew that Will liked it – holding hands, or lazing in a one-armed embrace, or simply touching to _touch_ – but it was a struggle most of the time. A struggle not to shrug Will off of him, to scowl at the genuine grin that Will beamed upon upon him each time he did it as though he actually thought it _funny_ that Nico batted his affections away.

Well, what did Nico know? Maybe he did in some strange, twisted way.

But not now. Not when he had Will before him, for once not grinning on the cusp of mirth and poking him for attention. It felt natural to graze his fingers across soft skin, to intertwine those fingers as tightly as their eyes locked. Even more when Will drew his own hand along Nico's body, as though he were as curious and fascinated as Nico was himself for him. He didn't understand why – Nico had never really considered himself all that much to look at – but the thought barely crossed his mind. He had other things to think about, other very _important_ things.

Even those thoughts were distracted when Will tilted his head slightly from the pillow and his eyes sharpened with focused intent. "Can I try it?"

Nico blinked at him for a moment, uncomprehending until understanding slowly dawned. And curse it all to Hades, his damnable blush arose once more. When had that even become a thing? Nico _never_ blushed.

But he nodded after a moment, at war between nervousness and eagerness as he followed Will's direction to roll onto his belly, as Will reached towards the nightstand in search for what they kept supplied there just 'in case' and when he drew cold, slick fingers down Nico's back, his buttocks, across his thighs. Nico knew he was blushing, but that hardly seemed relevant when, a moment later, he felt Will's finger breach him.

With a shuddering gasp, Nico caught his breath. It was an entirely foreign and unexpected experience, and for a moment Nico couldn't even discern whether it was a good one or a bad one. It was just different, and _weird_. But then the coldness faded slightly, the discomfort eased just a little, and Will worked his finger and twisted and suddenly it _definitely_ wasn't bad _._

Nico gasped once more. His breath was coming short and uneven as he grasped the pillows with one hand, the blankets with another, and squeezed his eyed shut. He felt his back arch, pressing belly into the mattress as his shoulder curved and head dropped limply forwards. And then the strange intrusion, the strange feeling, became something entirely _more_ when Will twisted his finger and a sparking of fireworks burst across the inside of Nico's closed eyelids.

A muffled cry slipped from Nico's lips before he could suppress it and his head dropped to the pillows, fingers tightening as pleasure shot straight to his brain. Will's probing fingers paused for a second and when he spoke it was with hesitant concern. "You alright?"

"Mm," Nico replied, little more than a groan as his head nodded fervently into the pillow. He couldn't manage anything more, not through the lingering memory of that brief touch and the heat that pooled in building throbs into his groin.

Thankfully, Will appeared to understand his reply for what it was, because his finger moved once more and grazed against the point that spurred a blast of pleasure through Nico once more. The second cry that fell from Nico's lips was louder this time, even muffled as it was, but he found he didn't much care at that moment how pathetic it sounded. His attention was focused entirely elsewhere, upon Will's fingers as he slowly, tentatively, almost painfully added a second to the first, as his other hand stroked across Nico's hip and down his thigh, as he hitched and repositioned his leg in a way that made the following probing positively sinful.

Nico knew what Will was doing. He'd read and researched and _seen_ just as much as Will had. But it was a different thing entirely to experience it for himself and every memory of that knowledge effectively flowed from Nico's mind under Will's fingers, under the rapidly building pleasure and tightness in his gut. His felt his hips rock of their own accord into the blankets, a struggling attempt to relieve some of the intense heat and tightness growing within him. His breath became heavy, uttered in pants, and the grasp of his fingers upon the blankets would have been almost painful if he'd managed more than simply noticing their existence.

He didn't. He couldn't, not alongside everything else. Even the strangled cries of his voice barely seemed important under the intensity, the sheer, mounting pleasure.

When it exploded, Nico uttered a choked cry strangled by pants, even louder than those before. He was lost momentarily in the darkness of his closed eyes, in the sensitivity of every inch of his skin as it trembled and quivered, and was only distantly aware through the onslaught of waves of release and climax that Will slowly withdrew his fingers, that he caressed Nico's hips once more before clambering up along the bed beside him. Nico felt himself become utterly limp, effectively sprawled on the mattress, and it was only after moments of hazy come-down that, gasping, he could open his eyes and even meet Will's gaze as he lay beside him.

He was smiling. In absolute, spreading delight, Will grinned. He looked as though he'd won first prize in a competition, as though all his Christmases had come at once, and that only made Nico's lustful blush redouble in embarrassment once. He turned his head to bury it in the pillow.

Will laughed merrily, with no regard for the confusing riot of emotions coursing through Nico that were all clamouring for attention. "Did you like it?"

Nico rolled his head to glance at Will sidelong once more. Though he wanted to – desperately wanted to – he couldn't quite bring himself to even scowl. "Do you even have to ask?"

Impossibly, Will's smile widened further. He leaned forwards and pressed a kiss upon Nico's lips. "Just checking."

"Well, don't. It's unnecessary, and a complete waste of breath," Nico replied. Then, with an effort that was far too pronounced than he'd expected, he pushed himself onto his elbows, drew and arm around Will's neck and pulled him back into a kiss once more.

No, Nico wasn't all that good with contact, and he hadn't predicted himself to be terribly fond of intimacy either. Except this was with Will, and somehow, that made all the difference.

* * *

After that first time, things were good. No, they were the _best_. But also the worst. But then, sometimes even that worst was the best. It was all so confusing that most of the time Nico didn't know whether he felt more inclined to stab Will with his sword or kiss him passionately in front of the entire camp before dragging him off to Hades' cabin.

That latter would have been horrifying. Nico could never imagine himself doing such a thing so the urge to do so was flooring.

It was the best because it was just so damn good. Nico had never experienced anything the likes of what he did with Will. In many ways he wondered that he hadn't, shook his head over the senseless dismissal of what he'd never tried for the fact that he'd missed out on something – or several somethings – that simply felt so good. But in other ways he was glad he had; Nico couldn't think of anyone who he would have wanted to experience such profound pleasure with, anyone he would have felt comfortable with enough to do so. No one except Will.

Nights spent sleeping together in Hades' cabin often entailed tentative explorations. They were utterly fantastic, too. Nico had never considered the sheer power that gentle hands and a ready mouth could have upon a willing body. Oftentimes, Nico found himself simply staring at Will's fingers as his thoughts drifted to the day before, or the night two past. Always at inappropriate times, too, like at dinner time in the dining pavilion and surrounded by hundreds of other demigods, or as he watched Will drawing a bow and hooking his long, elegant fingers around the string with delicate certainty.

That was one of the worst parts. Worse still because Nico would sometimes catch Will looking at him with the same expression he knew he wore before catching Nico's eye and breaking out into a grin that was far too suggestive to be adorning his face in the midst of dozens of his half-siblings. Nico made a point of pinning Will with a glare before deliberately turning away from him and resolutely striving _not_ to think about anything untoward.

It was harder than he'd expected.

The explorations of one another's bodies only unearthed more curiosities that demanded to be pondered. They'd tentatively experimented a little in the past – of course they had; Nico didn't think he would have been able to hold out until they were seventeen if they hadn't – but this was different. He'd had never considered that the act of _giving_ pleasure, of provoking a needy or gasping or moaning response would be almost as pleasurable as that of receiving it. But it was. It was fascinating how, with a lick of his tongue or a crook of his finger, Nico could induce Will into a quivering, weak-limbed and panting mess upon his bed. Or the couch. Or up against the wall; wherever the need struck, really, so long as they wouldn't get sprung.

He hadn't quite anticipated that Will would feel just the same, either. For some reason, Nico had never even really considered the possibility of becoming intimate with another person and receiving their full, undivided attention, attention, their focus solely upon enticing pleasure from him even when mutual physical gratification wasn't attained. He made the mistake – a truly terrible mistake – of pondering aloud his speculations of a night when he and Will dozed upon the four-poster bed.

Will had turned to him, arms drawing tightly around Nico's waist, and grinned like a child who'd been given a new toy. "You spend so much of your time glaring and scowling at people, it's nice to actually provoke some other expression from you. And even better because it's entirely my doing."

Nico didn't know whether to be embarrassed, affronted, horrified or angrily amused by Will's teasing agreement. He settled for somewhere embedded in the midst of the confusing mess.

He hadn't thought it could get any better than it already was. Oh, he had his suspicions, given that they'd hardly explored everything, not having taking the final step yet, but when the peak is reached, how was one to even contemplate that a stairway to the sky climbed further still? That was how Nico felt, and it was how he continued to feel until Will proved him otherwise.

It started out as most of their intimacy did; a smattering of kisses became tongue-tied and breathless, gentle touches became grasps and stroking fingers quickly fell to diving beneath clothes and peeling them from skin. Nico was used to it enough now to hardly even feel a spark of self-consciousness when his jeans and t-shirt were discarded to the floor in a pile alongside Will's. Even less so because he was almost entirely focused upon Will himself, captivated as always by the sight of him long and lean and naked but for the leather thong of quest beads strung around his neck.

Nico wrapped his arms around Will's shoulders, drawing him closer to him as Will leaned over him. It was made easier when, within moments, Will thurst the remaining distance between them aside by bodily folding himself on top of Nico until they were stretched out along one another, smooth, warm skin pressed together and forbidding even the sliver of mellow air from sliding between them. Nico bit back a moan that threatened to spill into Will's mouth, heat flooding his groin as Will pressed himself against him.

Friction and the unconscious movements, the gentle shifts, were tantalising in what they promised as much as what they elicited. Nico felt himself pushing up against Will almost against his instruction, slipped a leg out from between them to hook around the back of Will's knee and hold him closer. The warmth, the building pleasure, the intensity of being wrapped around one another, could surely only be better if they were to climb into one another's skin –

Nico paused in his straining for contact. With a hand grasping onto Will's hair, fingers locking into his curls, he drew their faces apart until there was but an inch or two between them. Their breaths panted heavily, combining until it was uncertain who breathed out and who breathed in. As Will realised Nico was the one who had drawn a momentary pause to their kisses, he blinked hooded eyes and raised a quizzical eyebrow.

"What -?"

"Will." Nico looped a lock of hair around his finger, tugging it gently. He felt a momentary flicker of embarrassment rise within him before he banished it. "Do… do you think…?"

He didn't say anything more than that. Nico simply peered up at Will, at his eyes darkened by the shadows of night as much as by passion, the flush in his cheeks a perfect pink upon his golden skin and mouth parted slightly in the act of questioning. Then understanding dawned and his eyes widened slightly before he tugged his hair from Nico's hands to dive in for another kiss.

Nico was quite relieved to know that he wouldn't really even have to ask. That Will just knew.

Practiced fingers fumbled for the nightstand, perhaps fumbling just a little more than was usual. The entirety of the approach took longer than usual too, as throughout it all Will kept pausing to lean back across Nico and plant another kiss upon his lips. Nico couldn't find all that much to complain about for that fact except that it just seemed to take a _long time_.

The feeling of fingers breaching him was familiar to Nico by now. Familiar and triggering, the expectation of pleasure welling within him even without the direct stimulation. Nico pressed a fist over his mouth to stem the urge to groan, dropping his other hand down to curl into Will's hair where he knelt between his legs, one had grasping Nico's thigh and tucking it towards his chest as the fingers of his other drove into him. Striving to relax, to hasten the preparation along, Nico found himself muttering and urging for Will to just _hurry up_.

"Dammit, Will, just do it already."

Gods bless Will, even with the evident eagerness that he blatantly showed he didn't move faster than was possible. Fast, but not too fast. Not as fast as Nico demanded, for which the barest thought in the back of Nico's head registered he would probably be thankful for later. Will only gasped a strange sort of laugh, mumbled something unintelligible of which Nico could only make out "making this harder than it already is" and somehow managed to adjust himself so that he was leaning above Nico once more even as his fingers worked inside him. The beads of his necklace brushed against Nico's neck and he wasn't complaining in the slightest for the shift in position; it just made it that much easier to wrap an arm around Will's neck and draw him down into another hard kiss.

When Will slipped his fingers from him, Nico noticed. He felt their absence with a faint hiss of dissatisfaction, a frustration that was stemmed an instant later when, Will readjusting himself further down the bed once more, replaced his fingers with the hardness of his arousal. Grasping Nico's legs, one in each hand cupped gently behind his knees, he slowly, hesitantly, and with a sighing groan pushed into him, the slick smoothness of lube and condom easing the passage.

It felt different. It felt _very_ different, and tight, and _huge,_ and for a moment Nico couldn't breath. He squeezed his eyes closed, hands reaching above his head to grasp pillow and headboard both as he was overwhelmed by the feeling of fullness, the weight driving into him. He couldn't answer immediately when Will paused halfway to ask if he was alright, and only nodded fervently with teeth fastened into his lip and said something that even he couldn't hear. He didn't want it to stop, though. It didn't matter that it was uncomfortable, almost painful for the tightness, because this was Will. And it was finally stepping over the border into territory of absolute intimacy.

Nico hadn't known he'd needed it so much until that moment.

Will fully seated himself with a final thrust and paused. His hands grasped the back of Nico's knees and, as Nico struggled to open his own eyes, to blink up at him through blurred vision, he could see Will's own eyes fluttering closed. The flush was high in his cheeks, his breath coming heavily, and the tightness in his face, the near frown, that Nico was all to familiar with by now. It was one that he'd grown to love for the simple reason that _Nico_ was the one who drew it forth and it was a visage of pure, unrestrained pleasure. His hand was reaching up and towards Will's face, a smile drawing unrestrainable across his lips even as he struggled to even out his breathing for the foreignness of their positions. He poked gently at Will's cheek.

Will's eyes fluttered open and blinked at Nico hazily. Nico somehow managed a smirk for the wide-eyed stupor that rose to combat for prime positioning in his expression. "Would you just go already?"

Will stared at him for a moment. Only for a moment, before his brilliant smile lit his face aglow. Somehow, awkwardly and in a way that made Nico feel distinctly _strange_ , he managed to lean forwards enough to press a kiss upon Nico's lips. Then his stupefaction fell to the wind. Grasping Nico's legs more firmly, he drew his hips backwards with a stifled groan and snapped them forwards in a sharp thrust.

Nico gasped. The feeling was as different to those he'd experienced when he'd been breached by Will's hardness as opposed to his fingers. Different, but certainly not bad. For almost painfully tight though it was, almost uncomfortable, with each thrust and each snap of Will's hips, that discomfort dampened. Nico found his grasp upon the pillow above his head tighten, his back arching and head tipping backwards as discomfort fell to rising pleasure. A pleasure that only rose when Will, through whatever haziness had consumed him, reached between them and grasped Nico's own arousal. Even more when, in a sudden shift, Will's thrusting grazed upon the point of pleasure deep within Nico. A choked cry was wrenched from his lips and he didn't even care that Will paused briefly in his motions as though listening to the sound like music to his ears.

It couldn't possibly have lasted long. Couldn't, and didn't. With each forwards thrust of Will's length into him, each provocation of pleasure and each retreat before plunging in once more, the rising tide of broaching ecstasy climbed higher. Nico found himself writhing beneath the sensations, lifting his hips to press them closer, to do something for the heat and the contact and the pleasure. For the _knowledge_ of what was between him and Will, Will and him, was simply overwhelming. The grasp of Will's hand around his hardness was almost painful despite it' deliberate gentleness for the dual attack upon his nerve endings. Higher and higher, with each thrust again and again and again and –

Nico cried out in a hoarse moan as a fierce thrust, a gentle tug of Will's hand, sent him cascading over the edge. The darkness of the inside of the cabin flashed into negatives, the throb of his heartbeat pounded in Nico's ears and he was hyperaware of every one of his nerves standing on end, every inch of his skin electrified as his toes and fingers curled. The warm stickiness of his release spread wetly across his abdomen but he hardly noticed.

Will continued to thrust in haphazard jerks of his hips for only seconds longer, groans of his own tumbling from his lips between ragged breaths. His eyes were clamped tightly closed and only squeezed tighter when, with a final thrust that bodily jerked Nico on the mattress where he panted at his own release, he loosed a sharp cry. Nico felt him pulse within him once, twice, thrice before Will's lazily withdrawal and continued undulations of his hips began once more to ride out the waves of pleasure. He collapsed with a gasping groan on top of Nico, nearly crushing the air from Nico's chest. Nico found he didn't really care – he hardly had the headspace to think.

They lay in stillness and silence but for the trembling of their bodies, the panting of their breathes. The cocoon of blankets and pillows around them felt in turns too warm and too cool. The stickiness of sweat and Nico's release adhered them to one another in a way that should have been unpleasant but wasn't. Even when Will drew out of him, Nico couldn't stand for a moment to have him move far and wrapped his legs around Will's waist to simply hold him there, his arms drawing around his shoulders.

Will turned dopily in his arms, almost lethargically, a puppet with his strings cut suddenly unable to hold himself together. He wriggled until his own arms wrapped around Nico's chest, holding them even closer than before. Nico could feel the rapid flutter of his heartbeat thudding like the flapping wings of a bird as it resonated into his own chest.

As the last of his heavy breaths faded, Will turned his head towards Nico. In blind searching, he pressed his lips against his forehead, his cheek, his jaw, and finally his lips. When they met, it was for the both of them to lose themselves in the warmth of breath, the soft press of those lips and the gentle slipping of tongues into mouths to taste the ardour of what still lingered. Nico lost himself in the moment once more, in the several moments, and found he didn't really care.

When Will finally pulled his head back – only slightly, just enough that his lips could move to speak without brushing against Nico's – it was to peer at him with a small smile and sparkling eyes. "I don't mean to sound like a presumptuous twat –"

"Really? You don't?"

"- but why did we wait so long to try that?" Will barely acknowledged Nico's interruption but for a slight widening of his smile. His pressed his lips to Nico's once more before Nico could even give a reply.

"Well, it's hardly our fault. We had a few hurdles along the way."

Will murmured a laugh into Nico's lips as he dropped another kiss. He could feel it throughout his entire body from the thrumming in his chest. "There was that," he nodded. "But this just about proves it."

"Proves what?"

"That we should never wait so long to try something ever again."

Nico raised an eyebrow, tugging sharply at a chunk of Will's hair with his fingers. Will hardly seemed to notice; he far from cared. "That's a bit of a blanket statement, don't you think? It could just about refer to everything."

Will's smile spread into an all-out grin. "Which is exactly what I meant. I have every intention of trying _everything_." He paused, then an expression of solemnity passed across his features that was entirely ruined by the quiver of his niggling grin. "That is, of course, as long as you agree to try with me?"

"That depends on what you have in mind."

"Hard arse."

"Have I ever claimed not to be?"

Will hummed a sound that could have been appreciation or dissent. His hand dropped to softly caress Nico's thigh once more; his sensitised skin trembled at the slight touches and Nico couldn't suppress a slight shiver. "No. And I happen to like you just the way you are."

"Well, that's a good thing, because I have no intention of changing," Nico said with a frown, tugging once more at the back of Will's head.

"Perfect," Will replied, and dropped another kiss onto his lips.

Nico held out only long enough for them to unlock their lips once more. Feeling the hint of a blush touch his cheeks, he affixed Will with a scowl. It was _his_ fault that he blushed. Nico had never blushed before he'd met Will. "Well, that's good, because I happen to like you just the way you are too."

The grin that spread across Will's face was his widest yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hope you liked the chapter. If you did - or didn't - please leave a review. I'd really, really appreciate it. Thanks!


	7. First Songs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: the time that the members of Apollo’s cabin realised that Nico might just have a bit more of Apollo in him than they’d suspected.

_"…and I'll a-sail onwards upon mine ship,_

_I will forever sail._

 

_"Till homely shores at last I'll reach,_

_To see my walls of every reach,_

_Of warmer winds,_

_And kinder men,_

_I will forever sail."_

 

The burst of jubilant applause that followed the repeat of _Ode to Odysseus_ sounded as the final note was struck. Will obligingly added his own clapping to the midst, and couldn't withhold the smile that spread across his face as he did so. He could sing the song in his sleep – likely did, if Nico's grumbles as to his apparent sleep-talking were to be believed – but the frequency he partook in such repetition didn't still his tongue any more than it usually did. Besides, as one of the oldest at camp, it was his solemn duty to lead each round.

Bursts of laughter ran around the campfire as the nymphs and children of Apollo alike lowered their makeshift instruments. The brief intermission that always followed every song was immediately flooded with friendly exchanges, with banter and teasing, giggles and exclamations. As always, there was a significant number to their ranks in the summer break and the feeling of community, the warmth of crowded bodies, drove away the shadows of the surrounding night.

After dinner campfire talk was one of Will's favourite moments of the day. It always had been, and not only because it involved the easy conversations and casual camaraderie of peers who knew _exactly_ what you were going through, what with being a fellow demigod and all. That was a big part of it; Will had always struggled in his childhood to find friends who fit just right, had struggled to fit himself to others and failed. Those moments around the campfire… they meant more to Will than he thought he could ever explain.

That, and the singing.

They didn't sing every night – it would ruin the specialness of doing so if they did. Throughout the holidays, however, when their number was more expansive, they would host a repertoire of numerous campfire diddies and traditional folk songs, spearheaded – naturally – by the Apollo cabin. And, as cabin counsellor, Will was most often right in the thick of it when deciding what songs to be sung.

If they were given the chance to decide, that was. More often than not, the wood nymphs who joined them, plucking at their instruments with dextrous fingers, would choose the song. Or, well… they would _pick_ the song. That was the way it worked; the collective, unspoken request of the most or most demanding minds would trigger the playing of a tune, and it was up to the demigods to sing along to it. It was a wonderful kind of magic, with the joviality of the most wanted songs lightening the moods. Unfortunately, it did result in many repeats of the same songs as passing thoughts and fond memories of previous nights or rounds at the campfire urged the nymphs into playing that which tickled enough people's fancy.

Hence, the classics such as _'Ode to Odysseus_ ", _"Down By The Aegean"_ and _"Who Wore My Toga?_ " were frequent contenders for prime playing position, alongside slightly more modern strains such as Michael Jackson, Lorde, Fallout Boy and Adele that somehow sprung forth. Will had heard more ear-splitting renditions of Beyoncé than he had ever thought he could handle.

Still, even with the occasional poor taste in music – or at least mediocre in his occasional opinion – Will wasn't complaining. He never complained about singing or music, even if it wasn't his forte when it came to gifts from his father. There was something about becoming caught up in the collective sound of chorusing voices, in the rippling undulations of tunes, in the shuddering quivers that tickled his auditory senses with a zapping thrill, that Will would never get enough of. He sung with the enthusiasm of the youngest members of camp, just as his half-siblings did around him, regardless of whether he struggled to hit the higher notes that Mariah Carey reached with apparent ease.

Apollo cabin members always led the songs. It was as simple as that. And Will always led along with them.

"Alright, come on, people, I'm counting on you for this next one. Gimme some Disney, I'm looking for some Disney!"

A scattering of laughter sounded throughout the members of Apollo's cabin as Sammy Harper made her demand. Will shook his head, grinning. Sabotage, it was, undermining the delicacy of the choosing system that was supposed to be objective and unexpected. Sabotage, but everyone did it.

"What is you with your obsession of Disney," someone half hidden by the darkness laughed. Will thought it sounded like Sebastian.

"It's not an obsession –"

"Yeah it is."

"No it's not! If it was an obsession then you'd have heard nothing but Disney songs all night and you know it." Sammy raised her eyebrows in the direction that Sebastian had called from. Will had to agree with her sentiment. The one time that little Monique, Amelie's younger sister from Aphrodite's cabin, had gone through her _My Little Pony_ phase had been exhausting for everyone. Will had heard more renditions of _Friendship is Magic_ than he had thought he could survive. The nymphs seemed to think the combined agony of most of the demigods was funny.

Laughing alongside the rest of his siblings, Will glanced towards Nico. His boyfriend caught his eye and gave a roll of his own, though there was the faintest of smiles upon his face, a smile the turned into another long-suffering eye roll when Will leant into him and hooked an arm around his shoulders. He didn't pull away from Will, though, which was saying something of how much things had changed since they'd first officially become boyfriends.

"Requests?" Will asked.

"What, for Disney songs?" Nico glanced up at him with a raised eyebrow. "Out of my vast knowledge of Disney songs, you want me to choose?"

Will snorted. It was a bit of a running joke, Nico's persisting and spotty ignorance of what was largely considered to be cultural norms. Will – and the rest of his cabin, for that matter – had been horrified with the discovery that Nico had never watched a single Disney movie in his entire life. They'd set to remedying that fact, much as they had with his resistance of video gaming or their marathoning of TV series, or owning a cell phone despite the fact that it was largely too dangerous for a demigod to use one when staying in one spot for too long.

"Not so much 'choose' but have a preference. You know you're good at pushing requests."

"I have no idea why," Nico muttered, plucking at the grass at his feet. His eyes drew towards Sammy as she spoke to Fionn at a million miles an hour; when the both of them talked like that no one could understand what either said. "I don't even like singing."

"I have noticed that about you," Will nodded. He'd never actually heard Nico sing, nor even seen him mouth the words, and Will wasn't all that convinced it was because he didn't know the songs. "But I have a theory about the requests."

"Oh, really?" Nico arched an eyebrow at him. "And what might that be?"

Will grinned. "Because you're a stubborn little shit who wouldn't accept anything but your own request. That, or it's the intimidating-son-of-Hades thing. I think even the nymphs are scared of you sometimes."

Far from scowling at Will's words – for which Will was a little disappointed for; h still liked provoking such from Nico and he'd been sure he'd elicit at least a little bit of a glare – Nico seemed satisfied by his contemplation. Only in a subtle way, of course, because Will knew that Nico would _never_ be caught dead actually grinning at wider than a contained smile. Not unless it was by accident. "Well, in that case I suppose I have a duty."

"Since when have you ever adhered to your 'duties'?"

"Since I felt like it, that's when."

"Which is practically never."

"I'm just selective about what I consider to be worthy of my time," Nico explained.

Will snorted, shaking his head. "Worth your time? That sounds a little harsh."

"You should take it as a compliment that I spend so much time with you," Nico said without even shooting Will a glance as he leant around him to call out a demand for the choices from Sammy. Will smiled once more, dropping his chin to Nico's shoulder; offhanded the words might be but they were genuine nonetheless and he felt the familiar blossoming of warmth spread through him at the realisation. That Nico and his scarcely gifted attention was offered to him. It hit him all over again once every while and he was left blessing the fact that he'd kissed Nico for the first time years ago, despite the debacle it had temporarily elicited.

Sammy, scooted out before her siblings to squat before them all, was directing her deliberate request with arms raised like a conductor. "Alright, people, I don't want any of the oldies – no _Pinocchio_ ; Reggie, I'm looking at you – and dear Gods not another _Frozen_ song. I'm thinking _Lion King,_ maybe _Aladdin_ , chuck in a bit of Phil Collins if you've a mind for it." She clapped her hands. "Come on, people, I need suggestions here."

"That's a bit of a unspecific request, you know," someone said.

"What about _Beauty and the Beast?_ Or _Pocahontas_?" Someone else suggested.

"Oh, or _Mulan!_ "

"What about _Cinderella_?"

"Ew, no, not _Cinderella_ , those songs are so boring –"

"How about -?"

"What if we -?"

"We haven't tried –"

The requests came thick and fast and, as Will had anticipated, when they narrowed their choices down Sammy turned towards Nico and put it to him. He obliged with barely a hint of long-suffering and within minutes the nymphs had jumped upon their communal request and their instruments sprung to life with the bopping tune of " _Dig a Little Deeper_ ". It would have been almost embarrassingly comical to see so many teenagers bellowed out lyrics from the _The Princess and the Frog_ had not Will been singing along with them. He couldn't help but grin and jig along to the music in his seat as he drew his gaze around the campers. The good-natured laughter broken by chorusing words – mostly off-pitch but perfect in its enthusiasm – and the general bouncing of every other seated demigod seemed to brighten the merrily flickering flames further.

The song completed with another round of applause and raucous laughter, hoots of "Really, Sammy? Disney again?" called from other cabin members and Sammy merely replying with a cheery grin. Poke and object the choices as campers did, almost without fail everyone joined in. They even had with Monique's affliction of _My Little Pony_. Even people like –

"You're staring again."

Will glanced towards Nico and raised his eyebrow. He hoped his confusion appeared genuine. "What?" Nico simply raised his own eyebrows and blinked slowly, so Will figured his play of complete ignorance might be pushing it just a little far. "Staring at who?"

"You know bloody well who. I swear you do it on purpose."

 _Of course I'm doing it on purpose_ , Will thought. How could he not when it got such a fantastic rise from Nico? He didn't like making him _jealous_ exactly but – no, wait, maybe he did just a little bit. Not only was it amusing to see Nico get disgruntled – honestly, there must be something wrong with Will that he still thought like that – but the possessiveness and jealously was oddly… nice. Will wouldn't be able change a thing about Nico, even the things he sometimes – _sometimes_ \- found some of his antics a little hard to live with, but it was nice to be reminded at times when Nico was struggling to wriggle from under his arm that he cared enough to object about who Will happened to be watching during campfire song hour. Finding that flicker of jealousy in his boyfriend had been like a gold mine for Will.

And if his eyes drifted once more to Paolo Montes as though he couldn't help himself… well, it did serve to make a flash of irritation dart across Nico's dark gaze once more.

Will shrugged with deliberate casualness, as though he didn't really understand the problem. "He's a good singer."

"How would you know? He sits about as far away from where you do pretty much every song night."

"You can tell from the way he holds himself. Drops his shoulders, lengthens his neck, the way he holds his jaw… Besides, he looks like he gets really into it, too." Will pretended not to notice the deepening glare that Nico pinned him with at his listing of features. Yes, that may have been more than a little bit deliberate, but it was entirely worth it. He cocked his head slightly as though contemplating the son of Hebes across the glow of the campfire, as though his attention was focused anywhere than solely upon Nico in his periphery. "As a kid of Apollo, it's sort of a skill to be able to read things like that from other people."

"You can tell someone's a good singer just by looking at them," Nico said dubiously. It wasn't a question so much as a sarcastic statement.

"Obviously. My dad _is_ the God of Music, you know."

"What utter bullshit, Solace." Nico shook his head. "Demigods can't just do that – "

"Oh, and that applies to you too, does it? You can't tell when someone's about to die when their time gets close or whatever?"

Will wished he hadn't spoken the moment the words had slipped from his mouth. He sorely wished he could retract them, for Nico's face slipped instantly into a blank mask, the disgruntled but admittedly light-hearted expression fading abruptly from his face. His gaze trained upon Paolo across the ring of campers but Will doubted he even saw them.

One thing Will had discovered that Nico hated was being reminded of how closely linked he was to death.

Clearing his throat and attempting to bulldoze through the sudden upwelling of tension, Will squeezed his arm more tightly around Nico's shoulders. He was relieved when Nico gave a half-shrug as though to attempt to dislodge him; that at least was normal. "It's not like I'm looking at _him_ , you know," he said, attempting to distract Nico. "Kids of Apollo just have a thing for singing."

"A thing for singing?" Nico turned towards him slowly and Will was relieved to see that his expression had become faintly derisive. Anything was better than that blankness.

Will smirked. "It's sort of like hypnosis. Or like, I don't know, a basketball player really appreciating the game of a pro."

"You're preaching to the wrong crowd here, Will. Basketball? Really?"

"I'm just saying," Will said deliberately, "that if you were so worried about me listening to and watching someone _else_ singing, then maybe you should sing yourself and then I'd watch _you_."

Nico turned fully towards Will and it was with relief that Will saw his momentary melancholy fade completely into derisive exasperation. "You're still pushing for that?"

"Of course. Until you finally cave I'll keep pushing it."

"Because you're a stupid son of Apollo who has a thing for music?"

"Obviously."

Nico rolled his eyes. "Not going to happen."

"Why not? What do you have against people hearing you sing?"

"Maybe I just don't have a good voice, did you ever think of that?"

Will laughed, shaking his head. "Do you really think that anyone else in camp cares that they haven't got a good voice?"

"Do I look like everyone else around camp? Seriously, Will, how long have you known me?"

"True. But maybe you just haven't heard the right song yet?"

Nico regarded Will flatly, and Will was given the very distinct impression that he thought he was an idiot for his words. Will didn't mind. Nico thinking someone was an idiot was sort of a term of endearment. "That sounds ridiculously romanticised."

"Doesn't it just?" Will grinned. Music was romantic; what could he say? "What would you choose, though? If you were going to choose a song to sing –"

"I wouldn't."

"No, seriously, if you could as the nymphs to play a song –"

"It'd be an instrumental one. No singing."

Will snorted, turning his gaze skyward in exasperation. "You're hopeless, you know that?"

"Because I don't like singing?"

"It's fun!"

"For you, maybe." Nico poked him in the ribs. "Not everybody in the world likes bellowing their lungs out for everyone to hear."

"I don't 'bellow'."

"Everyone in campfire song hour bellows, 'cause everyone's trying to make their own voices loud enough to be heard."

Will opened his mouth to reply and found that, realistically, he couldn't. He had to nod at Nico's suggestion – it was kind of true. Still, he felt like he was on a roll tonight and the next song hadn't started playing yet, so he persisted. "Seriously, though, what would you choose?"

Nico sighed long-sufferingly, like a parent would to their child's incessant questioning. "I told you, I don't –"

"Yeah, but f you had to pick one? Surely you've got a favourite, or a song from your childhood. Didn't you even used to sing any kids songs, or did that not happen in your time?" Will personally thought that the idea that children didn't sing along to songs together was absolutely ridiculous, but he had to ask. Maybe that was the cause for Nico's reluctance?

Because Nico was turned towards him with hooded eyes, staring at him directly, Will saw the exact moment that the shadowed boredom of his expression flickered thoughtfully. Only briefly, in the temporary glow or reminiscence, but it was very definitely there. Briefly, before being slammed behind closed doors once more. He deliberately glanced away from Will, as though sniffing at his suggestion.

Will would have pushed it – he was curious now – but an instant later Kayla nudged him with an elbow and drew his attention towards the playful bickering of Wesley and Jackson as they contested the superiority of electric over acoustic guitars. A serious argument, even if it was all in good-natured banter, and Will was naturally distracted. As the oldest cabin member of Apollo and cabin counsellor, it was his right and duty to sort it out.

Or at least he would have except that the next song started an instant later. Will blinked up inquisitively from the beginning of his attempts to quell what had slowly become a less good-natured argument and glanced towards the nymphs. In their little cluster alongside the children of Apollo, they'd eased themselves into crouches and sitting, rearranging their leafy skirts around themselves and assuming the distinctive stance of a quieter, calmer song. Fingers to strings and lips to mouthpieces, a soft, gentle and faintly haunting melody begun.

Will's wasn't the only one to turn curiously frowning eyes towards the musicians. He didn't recognise the song and if the stillness of the Apollo player's was any indication neither did any of his siblings. Nor any of the other campers for that matter, most of whom had turned towards the nymphs and let their conversations die just to listen.

Which was weird, because the nymphs never played something that wasn't requested by at least one person.

Understanding dawned upon him when, after barely seconds of playing Will felt Nico's shoulders tense beneath his arm. He glanced towards Nico to see his face downturned, chin tucked and eyes fastened upon where his fingers plucked sharply, almost viciously at the grass. The cuttings were making little piles of hay-like mounds but the unblinking glassiness of Nico's eyes suggested he didn't really see that either.

Leaning towards him and tipping his head down to peer at him, Will jostled Nico slightly with a squeeze of his arm. "This is yours?"

Nico remained unresponsive for a moment before he flickered his gaze sidelong to Will. He pursed his lips slightly and nodded. "Mm."

"It's… pretty," Will said, because really, it was. It sounded like a lullaby. Even the nymphs seemed faintly enchanted by their own music, if the gentle swaying was any indication.

As though reassured – or perhaps provoked – by Will's words, Nico hitched his shoulders and seemed to shake himself slightly from his thoughts. "Yeah. My mum used to sing this to me all the time when I was a kid. It sounds a little different – she didn't have music or anything, and the only music I ever heard to it wasn't like this – but I can recognise the tune."

Will struggled to keep from whipping around to face Nico bodily. It wasn't so much because of the expansiveness of his explanation as for the explanation itself. Nico so rarely talked about his past, and Will had never really heard him speak of his mother but in passing and to learn that her name had been Maria. It felt like he'd been allowed a glimpse behind the curtains that blanketed so much of Nico's thoughts.

He wasn't the only one listening in. That much Will realised when Austin, on Nico's other side, leant into him slightly with his usual calmness and spoke the request that had been sitting upon Will's tongue. "It has words to it then, does it? Will you sing it?"

Nico glanced up from his grass piles towards him, and though Will couldn't see his face, turned from him as it was, he had the suspicion it was guarded, wary. "I don't like singing. I'm not good at it, not like my mum was."

"How do you know? Did someone tell you?"

"No one needed to," Nico said with a shrug. His words were an oddly contrasting tenseness to the lulling music. "No one sung around where I lived. Not in those times. It just wasn't done."

Austin blinked with the incredulity that Will felt. "No one sung? In Italy? You're trying to tell me that no one in your town sung _in Italy_."

Nico shrugged again. "If you did, people just frowned at you and told you to stop. Even the good singers were told to stop."

 _Then how do you know you're if you're a good or bad singer?_ Will thought, though he kept his thoughts to himself. He did have to wonder, though, that in a town where no one sung why Maria di Angelo apparently had. And why the song evidently meant something to Nico if he didn't like singing, why the song had arisen in his mind at all.

"It sounds like a lullaby," Kayla murmured at Will's other side, which, he realised from what he'd learned of the distinctive _"Ninna nanna"_ lyrics, was a pretty likely supposition. Kayla sounded just slightly lost to the music and Will couldn't blame her. Slowly, she turned towards Nico. The firelight bathed her expression in half light. "Will you sing it?"

Nico frowned, though it was more of a worried frown that one of dispute. "I just told you I'm not a good singer."

"Good or not, a song deserves to be sung," Austin said from his other side. "If no one else knows it, then you should sing it. And besides," he gave a faint smile, "because no one knows it, you can't really step a foot wrong, can you?"

Nico didn't look particularly convinced by Austin's line of argument, so Will added his own contribution. He shifted slightly until he and Nico were pressed sidelong at the hip and dropped his chin to Nico's shoulder once more. "Will you? Please?" He murmured directly into Nico's ear, quiet enough to be unheard by anyone else.

Whether by peer pressure or simple inclination, or perhaps he felt a duty to sing his mother's song as Austin had hinted he had, Nico finally caved. He dropped his chin once more, but even with head bowed his voice was audible throughtout the hushed camping grounds. At least to the Apollo cabin members, all of whom turned liked sunflowers shifting towards the light.

Nico's voice was untrained. It obviously hadn't been used for singing, hadn't been practiced, in years if ever. The smoothness that would have resounded through a professional's was absent and though he was loud enough to be heard it wasn't through any resonance or echoing force of projection that Will knew from habit was characteristic of any singer.

But it was still beautiful. Maybe as much because Will had never heard Nico sing before as because of his actual voice, but he doubted that. It was soft, not too low, gentle and flowing in a way that Will had only come to realise was a part of Nico when he'd been gifted the glimpse of such from dating him. Wavering and light, then intense and thick, it mirrored the undulations of the lullaby as it drifted into repetition.

Will was learning Italian. He was making a concerted effort to do so and, though he wasn't particularly fluent in speaking it himself, whether it was simply that he was in tune with Nico himself or that his subconscious picked apart the words, he understood. What he could make out just made the lullaby somehow more enchanting.

_"Ninna nanna, ninna oh,_

_Sleep, child, go to sleep._

_Let shadows fall upon your back,_

_Wrapped snug from demons you'll stay._

 

_"Ninna nanna, ninna oh,_

_Sleep, child, do not wake._

_Diamonds light and steel black,_

_Ghostly fingers beckon deep..."_

 

It really was beautiful, both Nico's hushed voice and the lullaby. Yet even so, even as he recognised that, Will felt a cold shiver trickling down his spine. The words were… haunting. Soft and gentle, but surely it wasn't the sort of song to sing to a child to urge them into sleep, to offer comfort. Except… diamond? Ghostly fingers and shadows? Maybe it was just by chance, but it almost seemed as though the words were spoken for Nico exactly. What could be more relevant for a son of Hades? Maybe being smothered by shadows and caressed to sleep by the dead was comforting to him?

When the music finally died and Nico's voice with it, an unnatural hush settled across the campers. Will hadn't been sure if anyone but the directly surrounding members of Apollo had even heard Nico's words – he had hardly spoken loudly – but almost every gaze was turned towards him. Curious gazes, confused gazes, slightly enraptured as much by the unexpectedness as by the song itself. Will couldn't help but tighten his arm slightly around Nico's tensed shoulders because…

_I wonder if this is how Nico feels when he gets jealous?_

Slowly the buzz of voices picked up to fill the silence and the tension Nico held eased slightly. Not that he looked up from the ground, from his intense staring that seemed retrospective as much as sullenly defensive and embarrassed. As though he was torn between losing himself to memories of the past and accusing those in the present for making him sing.

"That was awesome, Nico." Kayla was the first person to speak up and voice her thoughts, and there wasn't a hint of patronisation in her tone. Regardless of that fact, Nico flashed her a suspicious glance that faded just lightly into scepticism the longer he stared at her. The rest of the surrounding Apollo cabin members hastened to add their own comments.

"What was that song called?"

"It was a lullaby, wasn't it?"

"I didn't know you could sing. Maybe you should practice with us sometime?"

"See, I knew there was a reason you spent so much time in Apollo's cabin."

"Gods, Nate, you're a complete idiot if you think _that's_ the reason."

Will largely ignored his siblings. Instead, he kept his chin rested on Nico's shoulder at that slightly awkward angle and watched his profile as he gradually eased from discomfort into his normal silent calm. Not that it eased completely, mind; Nico retained a very distinct aura of reluctance and Will was almost certain he knew what it was fuelled by.

"You don't believe Kayla, do you?"

Nico glanced at him sidelong with a raised eyebrow, as if to say " _Isn't it obvious?"_ "Not really. You Apollo kids have always been weird. I've done my part, though. I'm never singing again."

Will smiled with a shake of his head and, though he knew it would likely draw a scowl from him, leant forwards lightly and pressed a kiss upon Nico's cheek. "Well, that would be a shame," he murmured, with absolute sincerity. In such a short time, after such brief exposure, Will had decided that he did indeed quite like Nico's singing voice.

Nico didn't object immediately. He didn't scowl at the kiss, and Will was rendered quite surprised by the fact. His famous glare only resurfaced, in fact, when the next song began to play and, alongside the rest of his cabin members, Will dragged himself and Nico to their feet to dance in a riot of stomping feet and waving hands to _"I Wanna Be Like You"_. Sammy had evidently gotten her way once more with a _Jungle Book_ classic. Even through his glare, however, Will was thought Nico might be enjoying himself just a little bit. Something even approaching a smile briefly arose when Will grabbed his arms and spun them both around in a dizzying circle. He shook his head and rolled his eyes but it was definitely almost a smile.

That night, in the privacy of Hades' cabin, Nico's pretences of a sour humour faded completely when he took Will with all of the tenderness and gentleness that he always did. Because that was the way with Nico; just as Will had discovered that, for all he might scowl and glare, curse and drop sarcasm and snide comments with the worst of them, he was so much more than that underneath. He was always slow and thoughtful in his motions towards other people – at least when he wasn't angry or shaking his head in ridicule – and often almost hesitant. Far from the usual careless grumbling that he usually voiced, when they slept together he was soft and gentle. Just like his singing voice.

When Will fell into sleep that night, it was to the sound of Nico's voice. Whether it was simply the memory of it or an actual rendition of that which Nico had already voiced, it hardly mattered. Nico didn't want to sing again, but Will would make it his personal vendetta to remedy that mar against righteousness. Something so beautiful, even raw and imperfect as it was, shouldn't be kept hidden.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who commented last chapter! I was a little stunned at how many people left such beautiful, supportive words. Really, so nice of you. Thank you!!!  
> This was just a bit of a fluffy chapter, I know, but I hope you liked it anyway :)


	8. First Quests

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or: the time Nico and Will show the newest member of camp how it's done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So this is the LAST CHAPTER of 'A Series of Firsts' but (surprise, though probably not surprising!) I've got the SEQUEL ready to start posting in a week or two called 'Shadows Chasing Shadows'. If you're interested, please keep an eye out for it!
> 
> But otherwise, I hope you enjoy the chapter! If you do - or don't, or have anything to say - please leave a comment. I've loved every single comment I've gotten so thank you SO MUCH everyone who's left a word. It makes my day! :D

Nico and Will's first quest was, in many ways, also their last. It was their first because they'd never actually been on a quest with just the two of them before; always, they would be accompanied by others – Lou Ellen or Cecil, Kayla and or Austin quite frequently, even Leo and Calypso when the son of Hephaestus could be drawn from his bunker and inventions. Once, the pair of them had even joined Percy and Annabeth on a monster hunt, despite the fact that, as far as campers went, both were officially retired and moved on to bigger and better things. This was the first that it was _just_ Nico and Will.

Yet it was also their last because, as so often happened when demigods reached 'that age', they had too decided to move on. To leave the safety of Camp Half-Blood and actually live. At eighteen years old the both of them, it was finally time. Nico found it less saddening and more sort of… relieving. A little exciting too.

It wasn't all that much of a quest at all, actually. The Oracle didn't assign them a dangerous mission, nor request that Nico and Will pool their talents to retrieve some artefact long assumed by most to be mythical but was, of course, actually very real. No, for their first-last quest, Nico and Will were sent on a rescue mission of sorts. Or a retrieval mission. Or, as Nico came to think of it, a babysitting job.

Nico strode down one of countless main streets in Halifax, scanning the apartment buildings alongside him for numbers and the street corners for names. He'd never been to Nova Scotia before, and it was different to New York and Long Island, to San Francisco and even Venice in Italy when he'd finally made the trip to visit the country of his birth once more – it had been a disconcerting experience that Nico was confusingly both eager and disinclined to repeat. Window-spotted brick facades lined a road flooded only moderately with traffic, with motorbikes and cars and the occasional truck. The noise wasn't abominably loud considering it was mid-morning, and the sounds of the nearby shore side could be heard as well as smelt even at a distance.

"Every building looks exactly the same," Nico said, glancing between two opposite buildings that did indeed appear to be entirely identical.

"Just on this street I'm pretty sure. Which is kind of what the directions told us to look for. We must be in the right area."

Nico glanced over his shoulder towards Will as his boyfriend drew his own eyes along the buildings in search of numbers that weren't there. He scratched his head in confusion, tugging at the blond curls just long enough to pull back into a stout ponytail and frowned. His other hand tugged idly on the end of the bow slung over his shoulder, its curving length batting gently against the back of his knees. Frowning, he drew his gaze to meet Nico's, eyes faintly narrowed. "Do you think we should call her?"

"Who, Ivy? Really, Will, this is a satyr we're talking about."

"It might be worth a try."

"Have you ever met a satyr inclined to using a cell phone?"

"True," Will admitted with an faintly exasperated nod. Then he went back to scanning along the roadside, turning on the spot. "She said, what, third building along from the corner, right?"

"Satyrs have an appalling sense of direction for urban areas," Nico sighed, shaking his head as he counted from each corner once more and settled the four identical buildings into his sweeping gaze, one after another. "Could she have possibly been any more vague?"

"At least she gave us the street name."

"Which was wrong."

"Only by one letter."

"Actually, two. C is different to K –"

"Only literally, not phonetically."

"- and there is no way that anyone could realistically confuse an S with a T."

Will smirked, teeth flashing in genuine amusement that was just slightly infuriating in an already frustrating situation. "Yeah, I'll give you that one. But we got it eventually."

"By sheer luck," Nico muttered, turning in his own circle to glance once more between the four possible apartment buildings. "She said she'd come outside the building at ten o'clock, right?" He glanced towards Will's wrist and the watch just visibly poking out from the cuffs of his jacket. "I hope she appreciates how hard it is to get here by exactly ten o'clock the very day after she asks for help."

"Of course she would. Ivy's about as inclined towards gratitude as she is resistant to using a cell phone." Will said, obligingly dropped his gaze to his watch. "Yeah, it's about spot on ten. And…" He glanced up, scanning once more along either direction of the street before a satisfied smile reasserted itself. "There's our satyr."

Nico turned in the direction Will pointed across the road, distracted momentarily by a procession of passing cars. He caught sight of a girl with short, curly dark hair and wide brown eyes standing outside one of the apartment buildings that was _not,_ in fact, one of the ones that Nico had deduced from her directions as being the only four she could have possibly indicated. The satyr glanced along the length of road in much the same way that Will had moments before, a slightly concerned frown upon her brow. A frown that cleared into relief when she caught sight of Will's upraised arm waving towards her.

Nico followed in Will's wake as they set off at a jog down and across the road, meeting Ivy as she took several short steps towards them from the door to the redbrick apartment building. She looked to be about fourteen years old, shrouded in an unseasonably thick jacket and bootleg jeans that didn't quite manage to cover the shoeless hooves poking out from the bottom. She made little _clack_ ing steps as she approached them.

A heavy breath of relief sighed from her lips as Nico and Will slowed to a stop before her, edging to the inner side of the footpath to make way for the thin stream of pedestrians. She raised a hand to tug with what was evidently a nervous twitch at the nearly imperceptible bud of the horns poking through her curls and gave a wavering smile. "You're Nico di Angelo and Will Solace, right?"

Will – because it was always Will who replied, maintaining that, practice though Will urged him to, Nico lacked many of the fundaments that enabled most people to interact with others in a socially acceptable manner – gave an easy and reassuring smile in return. A reassurance that visibly calmed the young satyr before Nico's in that way that Will could. "That's us."

"Thanks so much for coming on such short notice." The satyr sighed her relief once more. "I just didn't know what else to do, and after the attack yesterday morning… I thought it was about time I called for extra support."

Will shrugged. "That's okay. It wasn't like we were doing anything important." Nico could have argued that fact – he could have thought of at least one thing he could have been doing rather then making a spontaneous day trip to Nova Scotia – but he held his tongue. Ivy was clearly only just short of frayed nerves and Will always liked to tell him that he wasn't exactly the most comforting of people when such nerves were high. "You're having a bit of trouble, then?"

Ivy nodded fervently before launching into a garbled rundown of what Nico was blessedly already informed of. He doubted he'd have been able to make much sense of it otherwise. "Yeah, well, no, not trouble exactly. Well, yeah, I suppose it is trouble that I'm having, but no more than usual. Not much more. Not because – I mean, it's not really anyone's fault. Ven's dad's just really worried about her leaving and doesn't think she'll actually be safe at Camp Half-Blood, and he only gets more and more insistent that she's not going the more often I suggest it, and I have tried to explain it to him but he just doesn't budge!" She chewed worriedly upon her bottom lip as though it were a tin can. "I've been with her for nearly three years now, and the monster attacks are only getting worse."

"Doesn't the kid realise she's in danger?" Nico asked. "Doesn't she realise that she'll put her dad in danger too by sticking around? It'll only get worse the older she gets; demigods can't stay in one place for too long, not without the proper defences. How old is she now? Thirteen already, right?"

Ivy's worried frown arose once more. "Fourteen last month."

"The monsters must be running riot, then," Will muttered, shaking his head. "How many attacks has she had since her birthday?"

"Actual attacks, or how many monsters have we seen?"

"Is there a difference?"

Ivy nodded. "Sometimes I manage to notice them and grab Ven away before they get around to attacking her. We've gotten pretty good at running away."

"And when you're not able to run?" Nico asked. "How many limbs does this girl actually still have?"

At Ivy's flinching wince, Will spared Nico a long-suffering glance that clearly asked " _did you have to?_ " Nico shrugged as Ivy replied. "She's not been really badly hurt so far. Or at least not – not lately. And we've only actually encountered three monsters since she turned fourteen. We managed to defeat them all, or at least injure them enough so that we could get away. Thankfully."

"Luckily, I'd say."

"Well, her dad did make sure she's practiced in self-defence. He's one of those work out maniacs, taking Krav Maga practically since he could walk."

"Taking what?" Will asked.

"Israeli military self-defence," Nico supplied.

"How do you even know something like that?"

Nico ignored Will's question that just bordered upon disbelievingly condescending. "So she's relatively capable. That's good to know. But seriously, after being attacked by monsters that most people can't see so often, it didn't occur to her that maybe she should take your word for it and go to one of the few places on earth that is actually safe from those monsters?"

Ivy shifted slightly in place, a sad cast shadowing her face. "She really loves her dad. Even if he is being a little bit…"

"Stupid? Moronic?"

"I think stubborn and protective is probably a better description for it," Will supplied with another admonishing glance Nico's way. Tugging the end of his bow unconsciously once more, he turned back towards Ivy. "Is her dad home yet?"

Ivy nodded. "He's off work today. I made sure that he would be home when you got here."

"Oh, joy," Nico muttered, rolling his eyes. "Because it would be so much easier to _talk_ the stubborn idiot into letting us effectively abduct his daughter rather than just taking her with us no questions asked."

"You don't think he would worry if his daughter suddenly disappeared?" Will asked with a snort. "You know he's one of the sort that lives in denial of reality. Chiron said he never quite believed that his daughter's mum was a Greek Goddess."

"Yeah, because he's an idiot. Of course he'd worry, _because he's an idiot_. But at least he would be able to worry rather than be mourning her death because, after staying away from safety for so long, she managed to get herself killed."

"Tact, Nico. A little bit of tact, please," Will said, tilting his head towards a visibly horrified Ivy. Here eyes had grown to fill most of her face.

"I think the words you're looking for are 'coddling untruths' more than tact," Nico replied, but he quelled his condescension to turn to Ivy once more. He nodded head back towards the apartment building she'd appeared from. "Shall we get this over with, then?"

At the satyr's pause – satyrs really were so ridiculously overprotective of their charges – Will stepped in to alleviate her evident fears. "Don't worry, I'll do most of the convincing."

Nico tried not to roll his eyes once more as Ivy visibly relaxed at his words.

Contrary to what the plainness of the outside of the building looked like, the interior was outfitted with evidently expensive décor. From the moment they stepped through the doors, it was onto rich carpets and between pale, timber-corniced walls, to travel up a widely curving stairwell of polished banishers and wide steps alongside an equally sleekly polished elevator. It was one of those old ones, that looked like they'd been modelled on the earliest versions of their predecessors though absented of the kinks and errors of their structure. Ivy led Nico and Will up five levels to the top floor, trotting along a similarly richly carpeted hallway far too brightly lit for Nico's tastes and boasting only a pair of elaborately carved doors across from one another. Each had gleamingly golden numbers of five-one and five-two at roughly head height. Ivy took the one on the left.

Her fingers rapped in a jittery dance of knuckles. "Ven? Ven, it's Ivy. Can I come back in?" There was a pause for a moment, then the door cracked open slightly. The golden security chain clinked slightly before it pulled taut. The thin, pale face of a girl five years Nico's junior peered through the crack, barely visible but for one wide, hazel eye blinking nervously out into the corridor. An eye that fastened briefly upon Ivy before flickering to Nico and Will behind her.

"Are they…?"

Ivy glanced over her shoulder and Nico could make out a rebirth of her worried frown. She visibly tried and failed to vanquish it once more. "These are the guys that I told you about, remember? From that camp for people that have the same things happen to them as you?"

The girl – Ven – darted her gaze between Nico and Will nervously. She didn't speak for a long moment and when she did it was just as hesitantly as she had spoken before. "I… I'm not making any promises, Ivy. You know I'm going to stay with Dad until he tells me he thinks I should go."

Ivy nodded. "I know. But just let Will and Nico – that's these guys – let them talk to him and maybe they can convince him that it might be a good idea for you to go to camp – to somewhere a little bit safer."

From the reluctance clearly evident in her single eye, Nico wasn't entirely sure that Ven wanted her father to be convinced. But after another pause she finally gave a slow nod and closed the door. A rattle of chain preceded its opening once more and at Ivy's beckoning gesture Nico and Will followed her inside.

The apartment was as expensive as the rest of the building suggested it would be. Wide rooms with wide doorways and equally wide windows, it gave a semblance of openness even larger than the extensive series of rooms actually was, and was surprisingly warm considering that openness and the absence of curtains across the window to stave of the outdoor chill. Nico followed behind Will as Ven and Ivy led them down a brightly-lit hallway – Gods, was that a vase with a single rose in it? Beside what was obviously a perfectly staged family photo? How cliché – and into a room that appeared part living area, part dining room and part kitchen. It somehow managed the combination without appearing cluttered or cheap; if anything, Nico thought it looked a little sparsely furnished, almost sterile for its minimalistic tidiness.

In the kitchen, throwing together what looked like one of those disgusting green smoothies that were more celery sticks and spinach than milk and _real_ smoothie, was a tall man with his back to them. Tall, but not really any taller than Nico or Will themselves, even if his broad-shouldered frame and the bulging muscles of his arms did make him seem far larger. He had chestnut much like his daughter, Nico noticed, and as he turned curiously at their entrance, Nico saw that their colouration wasn't the only thing they had in common: a thin but attractive face, straight, ridiculously symmetrical features and wide eyes. The man was younger than Nico had expected someone to be given that he had a fourteen-year-old daughter, and he momentarily scolded the God that had seduced someone who, at the time, must have been younger than Nico now was himself.

The curiosity in the man's face shifted into a frown as his attention drifted from Ivy to Nico and Will. A frown that was wary and growing into surprised anger. Nico could hazard a guess that such wary anger was likely more directed towards himself than to Will, despite the unconcealed bow slung over Will's shoulder. Will had dressed himself to be at least mildly presentable, in comfortable jeans and joggers, a scarf wrapped loosely around his neck. The presentation was completed by the green medic shirt that he wore underneath, one of several identical shirts that he practically lived in, just visible at the unzipped neck of the thick new jacket his mother sent him annually. He could have passed for a freshman college student, and a friendly one at that from the smile that seemed to simply settle naturally upon his lips even when he didn't feel particularly happy or amused. Will was just the sort of approachable person that people liked on sight.

In contrast, Nico knew that even a momentary glimpse of himself would be more likely to elicit the opposite response. It wasn't entirely by chance, either; Nico knew he wasn't particularly encouraging when it came to inviting the companionship of others, and that was quite how he liked it. Black on black, a leather jacket with fingerless gloves, skull earring that mirrored that on his finger and that had initially made Will quail before he'd admitted that he had actually grown to quite like it. And the sword poking over his shoulder. Yes, Nico thought the sword probably topped off the impression; though it was usually shrouded by the Mist, anyone who had been so favoured by the Gods as to raise their child would undoubtedly be able to see it.

Nico was the shadow to Will's vibrant light, just as he always had been.

The man had grown so wary that he actually lowered his health smoothie to the granite bench top. He flickered a gaze to his daughter. "Venus? Who's this?"

Nico couldn't withhold a snort. "Venus? Seriously?" He glanced towards the girl who gave him a wary, questioning glance. "I just thought your name was Ven. Well, no prize for guessing who your mum is." He turned towards the man. "I have to ask, did she request that you call her daughter after her or was it an actual decision on your part?"

The man's eyes darted between his daughter and Nico, his wariness warring with a growing agitation and the unfolding of his anger. Will, mediator that he always was, spared a _"must you?"_ glance for Nico before hastening to attempt to patch up the situation. "Sorry, Mr Hannon, that was very rude."

"Yes, it was. Very rude." Nico agreed. "Even if it is true."

"Let me introduce myself. Ourselves," Will continued, ignoring Nico's words and stepping forwards with an outstretched hand. "My name's Will and this is Nico. We're from Camp Half-Blood – I think Ivy might have told you about it?"

Mr Hannon stared at Will's hand as though it was a viper. Then he glanced towards him, to Nico, before turning to Ivy. "Camp Half-Blood? That's the place that you said would be safe for Venus. You two are from there?" At Will's nod, far from easing, Hannon's face settled into a closed frown. "Who the hell are you people?"

"Suffice it to say that we sort of work with Venus' mum. That's the explanation that would probably make the most sense to you," Nico said, not even bothering to step into the Godly Parentage argument. He'd luckily been spared from having to attempt to convince any non-believers in the past and he'd hoped to keep it that way.

"You know my mum?" Venus asked, her wide eyes blowing wider in something other than wariness this time. She looked faintly awed, even eager for the first time since their arrival. She glanced towards Ivy, a little accusingly. "You didn't tell me they knew my mum. Do you know her too?"

"Ivy doesn't have a whole lot to do with her," Will said, sparing a smile for the thoroughly discomforted satyr. She gave him a wavering smile in return.

"What's she like?" Venus asked, her gaze swinging back to settle upon Nico as opposed to Will or Ivy.

"You want the truth? Kind of stuck up and airheaded, actually, and surprisingly ditsy considering how old she is."

"Nico," Will sighed.

"And she looks like a man."

"Nico, _seriously_ ," Will said, bumping his shoulder against him in a way that wasn't quite as friendly as such a gesture usually was.

Nico shrugged, biting back a smirk at the bafflement and growing indignation spreading across both Venus and Hannon's faces. "Well, she does."

"Only to you."

"Oh, I'm fairly certain that she does to you, too."

"Are you actually incapable of being anything but blunt and tactless?" Will shook his head, though in spite of his objections and the seriousness he had previously claimed he would approach the situation with he actually looked to be struggling to withhold his own amusement. "Seriously, a little less of the cold truths might be nice."

"As a son of the definitive truth-teller, I would have thought you'd be happy I was being so honest."

"There's such a thing as too much honesty."

"Isn't it sacrilege for someone like you to say something like that, Will?"

"What are you two -? What are you -?" Hannon stuttered into their banter. Nico turned towards him to see the man's eyes darting between them, a faint flush to his cheeks and anger clearly tightening his face now. "What the hell are you going on about?"

Will immediately became contrite, something that Nico had never been particularly good as – he crossed his arms and forced himself to bite his tongue instead. "I apologise, Mr Hannon. That was rude of us. We tend to get a bit carried away sometimes."

"Rude? Rude is the least of it. You tell me who the hell you are and what you want or I don't care that you're a friend or colleague or distant relation of Ivy's or whatever, you can take yourselves out of my house!"

 _Well, this isn't going as well as we'd hoped,_ Nico thought, acknowledging the admission of guilt that rose to the forefront of his mind for the objective truth that it was. He turned to Will expectantly, awaiting the response his boyfriend was left to handle.

Will visibly composed himself, adopted the slight smile that so often served to comfort people and ease tensions, and drew a deep breath to reply. "As you've said, we are friends of Ivy of a sort. We come from a place that offers protection to people like your daughter who are maybe considered… endangered by certain aspects of their surroundings."

"Protection?" Hannon frowned, though he didn't look or sound quite as angry as he had been at being subjected to Will's calming tone. Will had that effect on people. "Protection from –"

"The monsters," Venus murmured. She flinched slightly at the words that fell from her own lips and glanced nervously towards her father. "From the things that attack me, right? That's what Ivy says."

"Those monsters that bully my daughter can't be avoided just by moving schools," Hannon said. "You don't think I've tried that? Why do you think I've moved to Halifax in the first place? I'm from California, for God's sake."

It took Nico a moment to work out the meaning behind what Hannon had said. When he did he couldn't suppress a disbelieving snort, nor the glance that he shot towards Will. Similar disbelief, though with an effort to hide it, was evident upon Will's face too.

 _He's deliberately ignoring reality,_ Nico thought incredulously. _He's using the excuse of 'bullies from school' for the attacks made upon his what's-her-name._ Nico shook his head. Honestly, how deliberately ignorant could the man be? Chiron had said that Ivy had relayed the seriousness of the attacks that had occurred on more than once instance. That Venus had broken her arm twice, her ankle once, had even received a concussion from one such instance, and that her father's response was to complain to her school – who could realistically do nothing – before withdrawing his daughter and readmitting her elsewhere.

Nico had to wonder how someone could be so stupid as to ignore reality. Or maybe he just couldn't see through the Mist as well as Nico had suspected for a temporary consort of a goddess? Maybe he was one of the less cluey of the lot? In some ways, that would be even more dangerous than a parent who strove to resist offered help from a purely possessive point of view. Nico had simply suspected that Hannon had resisted Ivy's suggestions because of some stubbornly moronic disinclination to put his daughter's safety over his need to maintain their cohabitation.

_Maybe I was wrong. Maybe we were all wrong. In which case I doubt Will's good cop tactic is going to work so well._

Not that Will wouldn't keep trying, Nico knew. He wasn't the sort of person to get angry at someone else or make demands. After the one instance that Nico had really felt his anger years ago, anger directed at him, Will hadn't repeated the incident. He'd been angry, but it hardly held a candle against the flame of that explosion, and was most often directed at other people for their carelessness, or their lack of self-preservation, or their denial of his medical knowledge and doctoring instruction.

"Mr Hannon," Will said quietly. "The sort of… people who attack your daughter can't be avoided simply by changing schools. Not even by moving cities."

"Then we'll just move more frequently, as often as need be –"

"That won't work either, sir." The attempt as submissive respect in Will's tone was usurped slightly by the note of stubborn persistence.

"Then I'll keep her at home," Hannon reattempted. There was a faintly desperate note in his voice. "She doesn't have to go to school at all –"

"Dad," Venus attempted.

Hannon turned towards his daught. "Venus, if it will keep you safe to stay away from those bullies, then you can stay off the streets as much as you need to. If it means that we can just stay together, then I'll do anything." Hannon shook his head, and there was a mournful desperation in his expression that evidently rubbed off on Venus for the way her own face crumpled.

Nico spared a glance for Will and had to suppress a sigh at the sorrow and sympathy that welled up on his boyfriends face. _There he goes. He's lost it._ Nico shook his head. Will would commiserate, would relate to that which was going on between Hannon and his daughter because, to a lesser degree, he'd felt the same with his own mother. That, and he had a sore need to simply be around those he cared about all the time so really could actually empathise. Will was the type of person who would fight and plough through thick and thin to remain alongside those that he cared for. He would likely understand Hannon, would verbally commiserate with him in a way that Nico could not.

Nico had been able to cut himself off from others when the need presented itself on more than one occasion. He could harden his heart and smother his feelings, could resist the desire to cave to his emotions even if on the rare occasion they did break forth and erupt in demands. So much for Will being the one to convince Hannon and his daughter, Nico saw the situation for what it was and knew he'd have to step up.

He took a physical step forwards, folded his arms across his chest and narrowing his eyes as he stared up into Hannon's face. There was barely a foot between them, and Nico waited to speak until Hannon had struggled to draw his attention from his daughter for long enough to glance towards Nico. When he did, Nico caught his attention with an accusing, condescending smirk. A touch of indignation reddened his cheeks once more.

"Listen here, Hannon."

"Nico," Will murmured, stepping up beside him. Nico physically brushed aside the warning in his words with a wave of his hand before focusing fully upon Hannon once more.

"You're not going to get convinced. Not by us pandering around you and reassuring you that it's the right thing to do, that it's better for Ven – or Venus or whatever – if she comes to Camp Half-Blood like Ivy's been telling her to for years now. Because you're not going to cave. I know that, and you know that."

A vein throbbed in Hannon's forehead and his cheeks flushed further. Nico wondered idly that he could induce such a response from someone when his words really weren't all that accusing. Was it his tone of voice? His expression? Probably a combination of both, and Nico couldn't care less.

"But here's the deal. You can't come with her. This camp is for people who are special like her – you know what I mean by special, Venus." Nico spared a glance for the girl who twitched as though jabbed with a pin. He didn't wait for a response, turning back to Hannon. "You can't come with her to the place that she'll be safest, and she has to go there whether you want her to or not. And do you know why, Hannon?"

The vein throbbed in Hannon's forehead once more and, cheeks rapidly darkening to almost purple, he struggled to utter a reply. Nico didn't let him speak.

"Because she'll die if you don't. Your daughter will get killed if she stays away from the safest place for her. Everyone else," Nico made a gesture towards Will, towards Ivy, "they're going to tone down the reality of the situation and how severe it is so that you won't get upset. But I'm not that nice. You might not want to hear it, Hannon, and you might want to think that it's not as serious as it is, or if you just hang in there then it will go away, but it won't. Your kid is going to die if you don't bend your neck enough and accept that, just this once, maybe just for a little while, you need to let her go." He paused. "What would you prefer, honestly? To lose her for just a little while, still knowing that she's okay – Hades, you'll be able to write to her if you want – or to lose her for good? Because that's your only two options."

Silence met his words. Silence and thrumming tension. And horror. And terror. Nico saw from his periphery the wide-eyed fear on Venus' face, the faint nausea on Ivy's, the sad acceptance and just a hint of reproval on Will's, even though it was evident from his silence that he'd accepted Nico's approach as necessary. But Nico kept his focus upon Hannon. He didn't even blink, watching the vein throb in his forehead, the redness of his cheeks become blotchy with deep purple and ashen paleness.

Because he watched so intently, he saw the exact moment when Hannon broke.

* * *

Venus was still sniffling ten minutes after they'd left her apartment. Ten minutes rapidly darkening with the shadows of evening because thought Hannon had finally caved he hadn't let them leave with any particular haste. No, they didn't escape for hours. Nico had never seen a crying fest quite like that he'd witnessed. He'd had to take himself outside to avoid being sprayed by the profuse tears and flying snot launched from father and daughter both. Apparently Venus hadn't inherited the art of crying beautifully from her mother but had adopted that particular behaviour from her father.

Calm she had, however, if only slightly. Her eyes were still red and watery, she still sobbed slightly, and the press of the tissue against her nose must have been painful for how hard she squished it. But at least she was talking now, to Ivy and to Will who seemed to have taken it upon himself to attempt to soothe her and even cheer her up. Nico walked ahead, more than happy to let Will take the reins in this situation. He wasn't particularly inclined to partaking in a crash course of Greek mythology that was riddled with more actual history than most of the world realised.

Venus was demonstrating remarkable resilience after such an emotional morning. And afternoon. And early evening. She seemed to have bounced back with more words that Nico thought was entirely necessary.

"But I don't really understand how I can have _so_ many brothers and sisters that are all around the same age as me. Especially when it's my _mum_ who's my godly parent," Venus was sniffling.

"Yeah, we all have to wonder that sometimes," Will nodded with a long-suffering sigh for the salacious exploits of his immortal relatives. "It's a bit weird, but they can sort of take on multiple incarnations at once."

"Weird doesn't even begin to cover it," Venus muttered. She glanced at Ivy. "You always tried to tell me that it was true, and that was how I was so good at convincing people to do things for me, or why I'm so pretty."

"And so modest, too," Nico murmured. Venus didn't appear to hear from the glance he spared her over his shoulder, though Will bit back a laugh and hid his smile behind a briefly upraised hand.

"I'm sorry I didn't really believe you," Venus continued, staring imploringly at the satyr at her side. "Or that I didn't fully believe you. I should have had more faith in you, Ivy. You _are_ my best friend, after all." And with that, she reached her arms around Ivy's neck, pausing them both in step, and wrapped her in a tight embrace. Nico was only happy that it wasn't him who was on the receiving end of the bear hug. He wasn't partial to hugs from anyone but Will and his sister, really, and definitely not sloppy, snotty hugs.

They were making their way towards the station, wading through the commuters heading home from work and ducking across roads that were thick with buses, taxis and honking cars. It wasn't far to walk but even so appeared to be taking at least twice as long as their trip from the station that morning had, what with Venus' distractions through talk and intermittent hugs and the thickness of the crowds. That and the excessively large suitcase that she dragged along behind her. And then they had to make it to the airport…

Nico was seriously beginning to question why he couldn't just shadow travel them back to Long Island, or even partway. It would tire him, maybe even exhaust him to transport four people such a distance, but it would certainly be quicker. Besides, Nico had practiced covering such distances with increasing frequency over the years, what with his trips with Will to Camp Jupiter. Maybe he could manage it?

They continued for another solid five minutes, in which Venus assaulted Will with another array of unnecessary questions and Ivy with another hug, before she spoke up with something actually useful. She paused in step abruptly enough that Will had to call to Nico ahead of him to stop. Gesturing down a side road sparsely populated compared to those they'd swum through before that and darkened beneath the shadow of eight storey buildings, Venus glanced up at Will. "We'll cut out about five minutes and most of the crowd if we just go down here."

Nico shrugged as Will glanced towards him. "Sounds like a plan to me. Anything to get off the main street," he said.

"You know, I could have picked that you'd be inclined that way."

"You know me _so_ well. Good for you."

Will only grinned.

It did seem a good choice. At least until they reached the direct centre of the street, halfway between towering shopfronts and blank-faced buildings of questionable function. Nico paused in step at the head of their party, freezing as the distinct sense of wrongness brushed upon his awareness. He glanced over his shoulder towards Will who, after a moment of meeting his gaze with a frown of his own, evidently felt it too. They turned as one towards the street.

The now-empty street. It was dotted intermittently with sleeping cars and litterbins overflowing with unsorted bottles and plastics but little else. The distant buzz of pedestrians, traffic and commuters seemed to grow abruptly more distant. It was definitely growing darker too, even more than it should have been with the encroaching evening. Nico wasn't foolish enough to consider that it wasn't just _slightly_ darker than it should be.

Without a second thought, he reached over his shoulder and drew his sword with a hiss of Stygian iron. A gasp behind him alerted him to Venus' surprise, quite possibly her fright, but he didn't spare her any notice. His attention were scanning the surrounds, darting over shadows that his gaze could penetrate better than that of his companions, jumping from a wafting sandwich wrapper to the flutter of a curtain through an open window. Something… there must have been something…

"Nico," Will hissed sharply, and Nico snapped his attention to him over his shoulder. Bow in hand, strung and arrow nocked, his narrow eyed attention was turned upwards towards the roof of the building across the street. Nico followed the line of his sight.

_Why do we always forget to look up?_

It was a cat. Or a number of cats. Golden cats, seven of them, lining the roof and – no, they weren't cats either, Nico realised as a eighth arrived with a heavy mane of darker gold fur around his ruff. Lions. In the middle of Halifax. And eight of them, all peering down from the rooftop as though eyeing their prey. Which, Nico realised, they sort of were.

Nico felt the jump of battle-readiness zap through him. It hardened the muscles in his arms, thrummed energy through his legs and urged him into a grounded stance as he stepped forwards between the lions and Ivy and Venus. Will edged alongside him, Venus making to follow despite the sudden wariness, the fear, that painted her expression. Ivy held her back with a murmur and a grabbing hand.

"Them," Venus croaked, her eyes fastened upon the rooftop. "Those lions. They're some of those monsters, aren't they? They ones that keep chasing me?" Nico saw her glance towards Will from his periphery. "What sort of lions are they? Are they –?"

"Not sure exactly," Will replied curtly, raising his chin slightly in what Nico knew as being his own stance of readiness. "Lions aren't typically the form that monsters take but…" He glanced sidelong at Nico. "Unless…"

"Let's hope not, yeah?" Nico muttered. Then he raised his sword.

As though they'd been waiting for some kind of signal from their targets, the lions flowed into motion. In a series of fluid leaps, of turns and bounds, they scattered across the rooftop, soaring in supernatural leaps across the width of the road to land upon the opposite building's heights. Then they spread and descended.

Will fired his bow with the accuracy of a child of Apollo. He loosed arrow after arrow with the speed of the professional that he was, spinning and turning as they approached. His arrows struck home, celestial bronze heads spearing through the golden pelts of the creatures and scattering plumes of golden dust from their point of contact.

Not that it slowed them any. They could have been mosquito bites for the damage they appeared to do, and for their horse-like size they sort of were. That if nothing else, if not for the fact that a pride of lions were in the middle of the city, told Nico that they were monsters. Hefting his sword, he stepped forwards when the lions finally reached them in their headlong flight, and he struck.

Stygian sword whirling, Nico whipped it around in a windmill of twirls, slicing at dusty fur with the double-edged blade. He ducked and dodged, parried at batting paws with flexing claws and smacking at the snarling jaws of the great cats that hulked towards him, launching their heavy weight like boulder projectiles. The point of his sword dug into the chest of one, pausing it in its roaring charge towards him to lose its head and burst into a shower of dust when he withdrew it to swing his weapon in a descending blow. Nico turned and caught the flying leap of another just in time to save his neck, nearly flung to the roadside.

Will was at his back. Nico could feel it even as he focused solely upon ripping apart the lion upon him, as he turned towards another. He could feel his movements, feel the moment that he exchanged bow for quarterstaff with a double tap of its end on the cement ground. He heard distantly the twang of the retreating bowstring, followed by the resounding smack of reinforced staff upon the skull of a lion.

Will was good with his staff, the weapon afforded him courtesy of Leo. He was very good. It was more than reassuring to have him at Nico's back.

Another slice, another burst of dust, and Nico spun back towards Venus and Ivy just in time to drive his sword through the spine of another beast. Venus was surprisingly holding her own – evidently those Krav Maga lessons had included fighting lions. Even as Nico turned to face another that had skirted the swing of his sword and Will's quarterstaff, she'd somehow managed to wrangle the giant lion to the ground with her bare hands, was straddling its writhing back and crushing its head to the ground. Ivy was upon it an instant later with a Celestial bronze dagger stabbed through the snout. Venus fell to her knees on the ground in a shower of golden dust an instant later.

Will was winning his battle against another two. One fell in a dusty spray, the other leaping back just in time to avoid having its skull caved in by the bronze-reinforced end of Will's staff. Nico turned towards the final two – final one, given that Venus and Ivy had somehow managed to take down a second – and threw himself into his attack.

He vanquished the creature. He did it easily enough. Unfortunately, not _fast_ enough.

It was the male lion who turned tail and fled for the end of the road. Nico, unwilling to let it escape, sped after it with sword in hand. A flying leap and slashing swipe sliced the creatures legs from beneath him, another to the back between the shoulder blades unleashing a roar that was cut off as it exploded into dust.

In that moment, as Nico thrust the full force of his sword through the monster's spine, the earthquake struck. A rumbling disturbance of the very ground that threw him from his crouch to smack heavily onto his side. Nico winced, rolling to a crouch immediately, only to catch a glimpse of the earthquake. Or more correctly what had caused it.

To say it was a lion would have been to call a Chihuahua a small wolf. The size of a pick-up truck, the towering creature was a reflective, metallic gold, burnished metal that shone as if polished. A heavy bronze mane circled its neck, silvery claws gouged the ground at its feet and as Nico watched it widened its jaws in a roar to expose fangs that curved like swords of stainless steel. A rumbling roar like the engine of a jet rebounding in ear-splitting magnitude along the length of the abandoned road.

Nico only had a second to think " _Nemean Lion"_ before it charged.

He didn't have enough time to dive out of the way. The sheer size of the lion was enough to have it upon him before he could even lurch to his feet. Nico didn't even have the time to ground himself to parry a potential attack, useless as he knew weapons were against the Lion. He barely had a second to hear Will's bellowing scream of "Nico!" and Venus' shriek of "What they hell -?!" before the monster leapt.

He reacted instinctively. In a way that he never had before, Nico threw himself from the beast's path. He rolled, his shadows caught him, and he fell through the brief stretching, squeezing darkness for a bare moment before rolling out the other side.

The Lion was upon him. Or upon where he had been a second before. Nico found himself sprawled on the ground behind the lashing tail, the powerful limbs crouching as though it had sprung like a cat upon a writhing lizard. A roar that might have even sounded confused rumbled from its chest and shook the very infrastructure of the street.

Nico didn't know what had happened. He'd never done that before, never fallen into his shadows like that so instinctively, accidentally, and _strangely_. He didn't have a moment to consider it, however, not now. Not when there was a shout of pain and anger and horror as Will released a useless arrow at the Lion with a thrumming twang. Not when the Lion reared its head and swung it's attention towards his assailants down the road.

Nico did the only thing he could do. The only thing possible, despite knowing that it was useless. He lurched to his feet, sprung at the Lion and swung his sword across the creature's heels, right where the Achilles tendon would be on a human. It rebounded, useless and –

And left a mark like chalk on a blackboard.

That shouldn't have happened. Nico knew it shouldn't have happened since weapons were useless against the Nemean Lion's impenetrable hide, but he didn't pause to consider _why_. Not when, apparently feeling the feeble blow, the Lion swung its looming, golden-eyed attention towards Nico instead. Nico turned, and he ran, sword slinging over his shoulder into his sheath to free his hands of his weapon.

It wasn't cowardice but practicality. He didn't have a destination in mind. There could be no escape from such an assailant, not without something like shadow travel involved. And Nico abruptly made up his mind to do just that.

If only he could get to Will, to Venus and Ivy, with enough time to grab hold of them all and spirit their little party away.

He ran like there was – well, like there was a Nemean Lion on his tail. Sprinting from the road, turning at the first corner and legging it along the next block between equally tall buildings, Nico didn't look over his shoulder to see if it followed him. He didn't need to, not with the ground-shaking thumps of the Lion's landings trembling the road in his wake. He spun around another corner, bursting onto a street that was actually clogged with traffic and pedestrians, and had a moment to cringe at the impact the monster would make before there was the crash, the crunch of a crumpling car. The thumping chase of the Lion followed him down the street.

Nico couldn't turn to face the Lion. Regardless of whether his weapon had actually somehow made the slightest of dents upon its skin, he couldn't afford to try and fight it. Not when a single swipe of its paw could send him soaring into the sky, or a touch of its claw could slice him in too. It was _huge_ and Nico, small in comparison as he was, was ill equipped to handle any sort of confrontation.

He ran with every ounce of his speed. That life-saving fuel that drove a demigod's fight or flight instincts coursed through him, adding strength to his limbs. He breathed as steadily as he could – which wasn't very – and dodged through startled pedestrians whose cries became shrieks of terror, bounded across roads and rolled off the bonnets of cars that screeched to a halt at the sight of the Lion that chased him. Nico wondered detachedly what they saw – a car chase? A truck moving with incredible speed and dexterity as it ploughed over and through the congested streets? It hardly mattered and Nico found he didn't much care; he couldn't spare a moment to think of others. His mind was focused, on the verge of tipping into panic with _what the hell, I'm going to die, Gods there's no getting out of this one_ that he barely had space for a coherent thought. Besides, monsters rarely cared about anyone but gods and demigods. As far as Nico knew, he was the only demigod in the Lion's sights.

Angry sights, too, likely because it had just been stabbed by something that was, in relative terms, little more than a needle to its gigantic size.

It was pure luck that had him colliding into Will as he rounded a corner of one of a main street. Luck, or perhaps Venus had a good enough sense of direction to be able to meet him at a cut off. They nearly fell to the ground with the force of their impact, Nico latching onto Will's arms to steady him just as Will grabbed onto him to do the same in return. He only caught a glimpse of Will's face, of the profound relief that nearly caused him to sag, before Nico was grabbing his arm and pulling him along the road at a run. He snatched onto the joined hands of Venus and Ivy as he nearly ploughed into them a moment after nearly stumbling over a bunch of schoolkids. He didn't pause to consider their surroundings or to warn the two girls of what to expect. There wasn't time for that when a hungry, slavering and roaring monster was on their tails. A monster whose proximity was shaking the road with the erupting earthquake of its passage.

Nico only had time to shout, a little hysterically, "Will, don't be pissed about this!" before he drew his shadows forth, wrapped them around their collective shoulders, and threw them into darkness.

There was a squeezing stretch, a rushing of wind as they dove without motion, the crushing weight of shadows and the void of oblivion that beckoned and danced just on the edge of consciousness. Nico avoided the tantalising fingers, mind set upon one destination and one alone. In what could have been moments, minutes or hours, felt himself flung from the shadows of compacted space. He felt the heavy weights of Will, of Venus and Ivy, tumble after him.

Nico's breath was smacked from his lungs for the force of his impact. He didn't usually land on his back, but attributed the laxness to the weight of his company, to the distance he'd travelled. For a moment he couldn't breath, a sudden wave of exhaustion and dizziness battering him like a tsunami as he gave a choking gasp up at the sparsely clouded sky.

Camp Half-Blood. Gods, he hoped it was Camp Half-Blood.

Nico's breath returned with a rush, and he found himself coughing in splutters as oxygen flooding into his lungs. He blinked rapidly for a moment but the blurriness didn't fade from his eyes. In fact, it seemed to actually be getting worse. And darker. Or maybe that was just the shadowy face that blotted out the light as a figure loomed over his head.

"Gods, fucking hell, Nico, are you alright? Are you -? What did you -? Fucking –"

Will. Yes, definitely Will. And an upset, worried and at least a little bit angry Will from the eloquence of his ensuing curses. Nico registered distantly that his hands had let go of their holds, though Will had reversed his to latch onto his fingers instead. With a sudden arousal of worry, the thought _Oh, shit_ , Nico rocked his head to the side to catch a glimpse of the two girls he'd dragged into the shadows after him. "Are they…? Will, Venus and Ivy –"

"They – they're alright," Will stuttered out, breathing almost as heavily as Nico's was. He wiped a shaking hand over his forehead. Or maybe that was just Nico's vision that was wavering and causing it to shake. He couldn't tell. Yes, his vision was very definitely getting dimmer. He wasn't sure, didn't really have the headspace to consider it through his abruptly profound relief. "They're fine. Venus seems to have recovered from her unexpected shadow travel remarkably well. She's crying that she left her suitcase behind."

"Is that what that sound was," Nico muttered. He heard his voice slur without his intention. "Oops. My bad."

"Damn hide of you, Nico. How dare you save our lives _and_ cut our travel time a hundredfold but forget to bring along her two dozen pairs of identical t-shirts."

"I'm the world's worst." Nico raised a shaking hand – yes, he was fairly certain it was his _hand_ that was shaking – and pressed it to his pounding head. He closed his eyes because he couldn't really see all that clearly anyway and that seemed to help a little.

"Don't you forget it," Will's voice said, and though there was still worry bordering on panic in his voice, there was the beginnings of relief there too, and just a touch of amusement. He was evidently attempting casual nonchalance with his words, but the effect was lost somewhat by the high pitch of his voice. _Always a giveaway. Fucking Soprano._ "Seriously, what the hell were you thinking? Shadow travel I can admit has its uses, and yes, it can even be necessary, but really? Biting off more than we can chew, are we?"

"You're welcome, Soprano," Nico murmured.

"I'm not being a Soprano."

"Can you hear yourself?"

"Yeah, this is my 'Nico, are you trying to give me a heart attack, you little shit?' voice."

"Yeah, that's what I said. Soprano."

Will gave a chuckle that sounded only about half-forced. "Whatever. If it makes you happy."

"Very happy," Nico slurred once more, and even to his own ears it was barely intelligible. "Hey Will, I think I'm going to pass out. Might need you to carry me to the infirmary this time."

"Oh, you're admitting it this time? That's a change."

"Shut up… M' bloody tired…" His hand dropped down wearily to the ground beside him.

Will's chuckle echoed in his ears once more. "Alright. That's alright, I'll take care of it." To Nico's ears, it very much sounded like _"I'll take care of you"._

A moment before he lost himself to oblivion, as he felt Will grab his shoulders and heave him upwards, Nico heard the echoing, muffled final question. "That thing you did, with the shadows? What was that?" He sounded almost nervous to find out.

But Nico couldn't summon the energy to reply, even if he had known. Which he didn't. He couldn't even shrug. Thankfully, Will didn't seem to expect it. Nico was vaguely aware of Will's arms adjusting beneath his own, of his chin rocking to his chest and being manoeuvred until he thought that he _may_ have been slung over Will's back but he wasn't sure. Just like he wasn't entirely sure if he actually heard the words "Don't scare me like that again, please, Goth Boy".

Nico didn't even have the energy to object to the _infuriating_ nickname. His final thought was of sardonic amusement, that as far as quests went, it might have been short but it was pretty chock full of 'excitement' before he passed out. Before he let himself slip into the more than capable hands of his boyfriend as he lugged him presumably to the infirmary, the sound of Venus' cries of distress fading into the distance. Honestly, Nico was almost happy for the increasingly persistent headache, for the watery ache of his limbs and the dizziness that he had an excuse not to deal with the latest addition to camp. He'd put in his hours and that was enough for him.

What a way to go out.

_~The End of A Series of Firsts~_


End file.
